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Medical Malpractice Economic Expert Witness

We provide economic expert witness testimony for medical malpractice claims.

Medical injuries stemming from medical negligence cases can be devastating for individuals. The injury can require years, decades, or even a lifetime of expensive medical treatment. The injured person may no longer be able to provide for themselves or their family members.

We’ve helped countless plaintiffs and defendants with our economic consulting services. We can provide loss calculations to determine the overall economic value of both past and future earnings losses and medical expenses in medical malpractice claims.

If your client is involved in litigation related to medical malpractice, give us a call. At The Knowles Group, we’ve helped our clients accurately determine economic damage calculations and have also provided expert witness testimony in depositions and federal and state courts of law.

What is a Medical Malpractice Expert Witness?

A medical malpractice expert witness is someone who has a specialized degree or qualifications that enable them to provide expert witness testimony that will be allowed into a deposition or courtroom as evidence.

There are two main types of medical malpractice expert witnesses. Most malpractice cases require hiring at least one Medical Expert and one Economic Expert.

Medical Experts

A medical expert witness is someone who has the education and has exhibited competency with their respective field and is able to evaluate and form opinions concerning the plaintiff’s impairments. Their experience as a licensed doctor gives them the ability to offer qualified opinions that can be accepted as evidence in a case.

A medical malpractice expert witness can range from a standard family doctor to a psychologist, to a specialist such as a heart surgeon. They all have professional degrees and usually years or even decades of experience. Sometimes, they will publish medical research papers to further bolster their credibility on a particular subject matter.

Medical experts help to analyze the facts of the case and provide litigation support services, testifying to the medical malpractice, negligence, surgical error, failure to treat, or other claim type. This is necessary first to provide grounds for seeking damages and compensation.

Economic Experts

An economic expert witness in relation to medical malpractice deals with the economic impacts from the incident. For example, they will be brought in to determine past and future loss of income or future life care expenses.

Or they can act as a medical claims auditor to assess the reasonableness of value of medical claims after the insurance companies and other parties negotiate the cost.

Economic expert witnesses are critical to medical malpractice and wrongful death cases. In addition to reviewing all court documents and performing a records review, they also consult various public survey data sources.

Economic experts are critical to a successful medical claim case. They help to analyze the various factors that are used in calculating compensation and damages. These include:

  • Medical bills and expenses
  • Lost wages and ability to work
  • The present value of future assistive and adaptive devices
  • The present value of prescription medication and rehabilitation

Forensic economists will look at past and potential future earnings. Based upon the pre-incident records, we can determine how an individual or a business performed through today and provide a present value in today’s dollars on all of the loss of future cash flows to the individual. Learn how we calculate medical malpractice damages and other economic damages in medical cases.

Types of Medical Malpractice Claims

Medical malpractice claims that require a forensic economist can stem from one of several issues such as delayed diagnosis, wrong diagnosis, or even negligent delivery when it comes to newborn children.

Here are six types of medical malpractice claims and a brief explanation of each:

Medical Product Liability

Sometimes, a patient will suffer an injury as a result of a defective or poorly designed medical device. When such devices fail to work as advertised or become defective, severe injury or death can occur. For example, an IVC filter which helps prevent blood clots can break and cause serious injury or death.

An economic expert can determine the financial impact to the individual as a result of a defective medical product. This can include personal injury, loss of wages, medical bills, and even wrongful death.

Delayed Diagnosis

This is a form of medical malpractice and results when a doctor is negligent in diagnosing a medical condition. This delay in diagnosis can quickly turn into a delay of treatment and cause someone to lose life or limb.

The Knowles Group can assess the damages resulting from a delayed diagnosis claim. These can include loss of life, loss of wages, diminishment to the future earnings capacity, work-life expectancy, future life care services and loss of household services.

Misdiagnosis

A misdiagnosis occurs when the physician fails to diagnose the correct illness or condition the patient is suffering from. This, in turn, prevents the patient from receiving timely medical care, which could have resulted in injury, illness, or death.

We can conduct an economic analysis to determine the financial impact to an individual as a result of misdiagnosis.

Surgical Errors

Surgical errors can arise when the surgeon is negligent during a procedure. Such instances of medical instruments being left inside a body cavity, damaging unrelated organs, or performing the wrong procedure all constitute surgical errors.

In cases of disfigurement or wrongful death resulting from a surgical error, it’s critical to conduct timely and accurate assessments of economic damages. We can provide litigation support and expert witness testimony after calculating damages.

Birth Injuries

Birth injuries or negligent deliveries are also considered medical negligence. The doctor or nurse could injure a newborn when it’s being born. Or, the doctor could be negligent in providing the baby immediate medical care for some condition that resulted from or during the birth.

In cases involving negligence and birth injuries, The Knowles Group can use data related to work-life expectancy, projected education, family history, and expected future medical costs to determine damages for a settlement.

Failure to Treat

A failure to treat occurs when a doctor arrives at the correct diagnosis but fails to treat the condition. For example, a doctor could release a patient too early, or before their condition has healed up. This is most often associated with hospitals and doctor’s offices that are overwhelmed with patients. The doctor could also be negligent in referring the patient to a specialist.

Do you need expert witness testimony for a medical malpractice claim?

Why File a Medical  Malpractice Claim?

Medical malpractice cases arise when a party feels that the doctor or hospital did not provide a reasonable standard of care and that breach of duty caused them to sustain injuries. There are, however, a few things that people should take into consideration before filing a medical malpractice claim:

  • Was there a breach of duty?
  • Did the doctor fail to live up to their duty of care?
  • Was there an injury or death that was caused by the breach?
  • Do you have evidence to back up your claims?

If you’re considering filing a medical malpractice claim, ask your attorney about retaining the services of an expert forensic economic witness. They can help determine your loss of income and other economic damages you sustained as a result of your injury. This can also help bolster your case as well as ensure that your future medical expenses are taken into consideration when filing the claim.

Medical Malpractice Forensic Economic Witness

At The Knowles Group, we understand the life-changing consequences that patients suffer from as a result of medical malpractice or negligence. We can ascertain important economic details about past, present, and future income potential as well as determine other economic factors. Give us a call today at (206) 860-9477 or contact us to learn more about our services.