| Today's post is shared from reuters.com/ Potential suits against the Dallas, Texas hospital that sent home a patient later diagnosed with Ebola face long odds in the face of state medical malpractice laws. Texas tort-reform measures have made it one of the hardest places in the United States to sue over medical errors, especially those that occurred in the emergency room, according to plaintiffs’ lawyers and legal experts. “It’s one of the highest legal burdens of any state in the country,” said Joanne Doroshow, executive director of New York Law School’s Center for Justice and Democracy, who studies U.S. tort law.
Duncan, now in critical condition, first visited Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital’s emergency room late at night on Sept. 25. Duncan told a nurse he had just returned from Liberia, where the disease is raging, but he was sent home with antibiotics. On Sunday, Sept. 28, he was admitted after his symptoms became worse, becoming the first patient to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States. Texas Governor Rick Perry on Monday said that there had been "mistakes" handling the Ebola diagnosis, the latest in a series of officials and health experts questioning the initial response. The hospital on Friday... |
