Specialized Medical Malpractice Attorneys in Maine

Doctors are among the most trusted professionals in the world. When you visit a doctor, you typically trust them with information that you wouldn’t willingly share with anyone else. Furthermore, when you’re facing serious health problems, you place your welfare in their hands — in some cases, even if you’ve never met them before.

This kind of trust must be earned in more ways than one. Doctors have to prove themselves to medical certification boards before they can make life-or-death decisions regarding others. A certified medical professional has proven that they’re familiar with vital medical standards and can safely implement them.

That’s the way it is supposed to work, at least.

Some medical professionals violate those standards and, in doing so, cause harm to their patients. If you’re unfortunate enough to be harmed by a doctor who violated certain medical standards, a medical malpractice attorney at Gideon Asen can help you take legal action.

The attorneys at our Maine medical malpractice law firm can guide you through the complex legal process and help you pursue fair compensation for the harm you’ve suffered. Don’t wait to get help after an injury — contact our top medical malpractice attorneys in Maine right away.

We Are Highly Experienced Lawyers Specializing in Medical Malpractice Cases

Simple question: If you or your loved one needed heart surgery, who would you choose — the primary care doctor who has never done a heart surgery in her life or the experienced heart surgeon? The answer is pretty obvious, right?

Why should choosing a lawyer to handle a medical malpractice case be any different? Do you want to trust your important case to a lawyer who mostly does car accidents or slip and falls, or would you prefer a lawyer with specialized expertise with medical malpractice cases? 

At Gideon Asen, we have decades of specialized expertise representing clients in every type of medical malpractice case. We’ve recovered hundreds of millions of dollars for our deserving clients.

At any given time, about half to two-thirds of our practice is devoted to medical malpractice cases. In just the last few years,we have successfully litigated high-value medical malpractice cases in Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. We have recovered millions of dollars within medical malpractice cases that were turned down by other lawyers who failed to investigate the cases thoroughly or to take the time to understand the medicine. We even have a doctor on staff who regularly assists us in preliminary case reviews to ensure that nothing is missed.

What to Do When You’re Impacted by Medical Malpractice in Maine

If you’ve suffered any type of injury or harm due to medical malpractice, it’s imperative to act quickly. Maine law generally only gives malpractice victims three years to take legal action. If you wait too long, you’ll no longer have any legal recourse against the party that harmed you. There are some exceptions to this rule for minors or when you see the same doctor many times over the years, so it is important that you speak with one of our experienced medical malpractice lawyers right away to ensure that you don’t miss any upcoming deadlines.

Maine doesn’t use the same discovery rule that most states apply to medical malpractice cases. In other states, if you were to sustain a malpractice-related injury, the statute of limitations wouldn’t start counting down until you discovered (or reasonably should have discovered) the injury.

In Maine, the discovery rule only applies to medical malpractice when a foreign object is left inside a patient’s body. This could be any type of object that isn’t intended to be there, such as a sponge or a pair of forceps.

Because you have such a limited amount of time to act, the wisest course is to get in touch with a team of lawyers that handle medical malpractice lawsuits as soon as possible after you suspect harm.

You should also get a full medical evaluation by an experienced physician. At Gideon Asen, we regularly work with some of the best and most caring doctors in the United States to help our clients understand what went wrong and help them obtain a financial recovery. Malpractice victims who consult doctors and lawyers for medical lawsuits typically get better results when taking legal action.

The Maine medical malpractice attorneys at Gideon Asen can determine whether you have grounds to file a lawsuit and how much your claim might be worth. We can also connect you with qualified medical professionals who can provide the type of assessments and care you need to recover from your injury.

If you believe you may have been negatively affected by medical malpractice, contact the medical malpractice attorneys at Gideon Asen today to schedule a free consultation.

Types of Medical Malpractice

Medical malpractice is a broad category of personal injury law that covers many different scenarios. The following are some of the most common types of medical malpractice:

Wrongful Death

Any time a medical professional’s deviation from medical standards results in harm, it’s considered medical malpractice. Wrongful death is the most serious type of harm that can result from such a deviation.

If one of your loved ones has tragically lost their life after receiving medical care that should have made them better, you likely have grounds for a wrongful death claim.

Birth Injuries

If your child was seriously or permanently injured during birth, it may have been due to the carelessness of the attending physician, a nurse, or the hospital. As much as you may trust your doctor, you should have your child evaluated by another medical professional who can determine whether the injury stemmed from medical malpractice.

Missed Diagnosis

This is one of the most frustrating types of medical malpractice. When a doctor fails to make an accurate and timely diagnosis of a condition like cancer or a traumatic brain injury, the patient could suffer severe health issues due to delayed treatment.

Even worse, the patient may not realize the impact of the missed diagnosis for months or even years. You could easily end up with only months or weeks left to take legal action by the time you learn about your diagnosis. This is why it’s critical to contact a Maine medical malpractice lawyer as soon as possible after a missed diagnosis.

Medication Errors

When a doctor prescribes the wrong medication, it can have several adverse effects. In the best-case scenario, the medication may do nothing to help your illness or disease, resulting in it lasting longer than it should.

In the worst-case scenario, a wrong prescription could aggravate your condition, potentially putting your life at risk. Similarly, if you’re allergic to a certain drug or it reacts negatively with other medications you’re taking, it could result in direct harm.

Negligent Documentation

Improper documentation is another type of malpractice you may not discover right away. When a doctor or nurse fails to document some part of your treatment or prognosis, there’s no way for other medical professionals to know about them.

This lack of documentation could result in another doctor prescribing a contraindicated drug or ordering an unnecessary surgery. Consequently, it can look like medical malpractice by your current doctor when it was actually negligence on the part of a previous medical professional.

As with missed diagnoses, this type of error often takes time to come to light. When it does, contact Gideon Asen as soon as possible to schedule a free consultation with our Maine medical malpractice lawyers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Just because a medical professional acted negligently doesn’t mean they’re entirely at fault for the harm you’ve suffered. You could share the fault with a medical professional. For example, you might have failed to disclose a medication-related allergy to your doctor prior to being prescribed a course of treatment.

Even so, Maine law allows you to seek partial compensation for your losses. According to the state’s modified comparative negligence rule, as long as you’re less than 50% at fault for your injuries, you can receive damages from a jury award. However, they’ll be reduced to reflect your degree of liability.