Medical Malpractice and Medical Terms Glossary
This medical malpractice glossary explains the legal and medical terms you may encounter in your records, treatment discussions, or a potential claim. Use it to clarify unfamiliar language and prepare questions about your care for an attorney. To discuss a possible malpractice claim, call 202-223-4488 for a free consultation.
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Medical Malpractice Legal Terms
Diagnosis and Treatment Error Terms
Birth Injury and Obstetric Terms
Surgical, Hospital, and Other Clinical Terms
Medical Malpractice Legal Terms
Breach of duty: A healthcare provider’s failure to meet the applicable standard of care owed to a patient. This failure may involve an unsafe action or an omission, such as ignoring a significant test result.
Causation: The connection between a provider’s breach of duty and the patient’s injury. Patients generally must prove that the breach caused harm for which the provider is legally responsible.
Certificate of merit / supporting medical opinion: A qualified medical professional’s written assessment supporting a malpractice claim. Maryland generally requires a certificate and report after the initial claim filing; Virginia generally requires a supporting written opinion before the plaintiff requests service of the lawsuit.
Comparative negligence: A rule that reduces compensation according to an injured person’s share of fault.
Contributory negligence: A defense that can prevent recovery when a patient’s own negligence helped cause the injury. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia generally follow this rule.
Damage cap: A statutory ceiling on compensation. Maryland limits non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases, whereas Virginia generally limits total malpractice recovery. D.C. has no general medical malpractice damages cap.
Damages: The losses for which a patient seeks monetary compensation. A malpractice claim may involve economic losses, such as additional medical bills, and non-economic losses, such as pain or a lasting loss of function.
Deposition: A witness’s sworn testimony taken before trial, usually in response to attorneys’ questions. The resulting record can help the parties investigate a claim or challenge later statements.
Discovery: The formal exchange of relevant information during litigation. In a malpractice case, discovery may include medical records, written questions, document requests, and depositions of providers or other witnesses.
Duty of care: A provider’s legal obligation to use appropriate care toward a patient. A treatment relationship generally creates this duty, and its scope depends on the care undertaken and the circumstances of the patient’s treatment.
Economic damages: Financial losses caused by an injury, including additional treatment expenses, lost earnings, and reduced earning capacity. These damages may cover documented future costs as well as expenses already incurred.
Informed consent: A patient’s agreement to treatment after receiving material information about its risks, benefits, and reasonable alternatives.
Loss of consortium: Loss of companionship, affection, or other benefits of a family relationship because another person suffered an injury.
Medical malpractice: Professional negligence involving healthcare. A patient generally must establish a provider’s duty, a breach of the applicable standard of care, causation, and resulting harm.
Medical witness: A qualified healthcare professional who offers an opinion about medical issues in a case. Such testimony may address the standard of care, whether a provider departed from it, and whether that departure caused the patient’s injury.
Negligence: Failure to use the care that the circumstances require. Medical malpractice is a form of professional negligence.
Non-economic damages: Compensation for losses without a straightforward price tag, such as physical pain, emotional suffering, or impairment. These losses differ from medical bills and lost income, and state law may limit the amount recoverable.
Preponderance of the evidence: The usual civil malpractice burden of proof: a required fact must be more likely true than not. This is lower than the criminal standard of proof, “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Res ipsa loquitur: Latin for “the thing speaks for itself.” This doctrine may allow a jury to infer negligence from the circumstances of an injury, such as certain retained-item cases, when the case meets the jurisdiction’s requirements for that inference.
Settlement: An agreement resolving a dispute without a final trial decision. A malpractice settlement typically provides compensation in exchange for releasing specified claims.
Standard of care: The degree of skill and care a reasonably prudent healthcare provider in the relevant field would use under comparable circumstances.
Statute of limitations: The legal deadline for starting a claim.
Tort: A civil wrong for which the law may provide a remedy. Negligence and medical malpractice are tort claims through which patients can seek compensation from those responsible for their harm.
Vicarious liability: Legal responsibility for another person’s wrongful conduct because of their relationship. A hospital may be liable for an employee’s negligence within the scope of employment.
Wrongful death: A civil claim arising when wrongful conduct causes someone’s death, including fatal malpractice. The governing statute determines who may file, which beneficiaries may recover, and what losses the claim can address.
Diagnosis and Treatment Error Terms
Anesthesia error: A preventable mistake involving anesthesia medication, delivery, or monitoring. Examples include an incorrect dose or failure to respond appropriately to changes in the patient’s condition during anesthesia.
Delayed diagnosis: A provider’s identification of a condition later than reasonably appropriate.
Failure to diagnose: A provider’s failure to identify a condition through an appropriate evaluation.
Iatrogenic injury: Harm that results from medical treatment or a healthcare intervention rather than the underlying illness.
Medication error: A preventable mistake during prescribing, dispensing, administering, or monitoring medication. Examples include the wrong drug, dose, patient, or route of administration.
Misdiagnosis: An incorrect diagnosis, such as identifying one disease when the patient has another.
Never event: A serious, identifiable patient-safety event that is generally preventable and should not occur, such as surgery on the wrong body part.
Birth Injury and Obstetric Terms
Brachial plexus injury / Erb’s palsy: Damage to the network of nerves connecting the spinal cord to the shoulder, arm, and hand. Erb’s palsy involves the upper part of that network and can cause weakness or loss of movement in the affected arm.
Cerebral palsy: A group of conditions affecting movement, posture, and balance because of abnormal development of, or damage to, the developing brain.
Group B streptococcus (GBS): Bacteria that can cause serious infections in newborns, including bloodstream infections and meningitis.
Hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE): Brain injury caused by insufficient oxygen and blood flow. In newborns, HIE can arise before, during, or shortly after birth.
Kernicterus: A type of brain damage associated with very high bilirubin levels in a newborn. Bilirubin causes the yellow appearance of jaundice; severe untreated jaundice can allow bilirubin to damage brain tissue and cause lasting disabilities.
Neonatal hypoglycemia: Blood glucose that is too low for a newborn’s age and clinical circumstances. Severe or prolonged low glucose can harm the brain.
Perinatal asphyxia: Inadequate oxygen delivery around the time of birth. If sufficiently severe or prolonged, oxygen deprivation can injure the brain or other organs.
Shoulder dystocia: A delivery complication in which a baby’s shoulder becomes stuck after the head emerges.
Surgical, Hospital, and Other Clinical Terms
Bile duct injury: Damage to the tubes that carry bile from the liver toward the small intestine.
Clinical practice guideline / standard-of-care guideline: Recommendations intended to help clinicians make care decisions. Guidelines can help reviewers assess treatment.
Hospital-acquired infection: An infection associated with care during a hospital stay. This is one type of healthcare-associated infection.
Hypoxic brain injury: Brain damage caused by insufficient oxygen reaching brain tissue.
Pulmonary embolism: A blockage in a lung artery, usually caused by a blood clot that travels from elsewhere in the body. A pulmonary embolism can be life-threatening.
Retained surgical item: A surgical sponge, instrument, needle, or other item unintentionally left inside a patient after a procedure.
Sepsis: A life-threatening, extreme response to infection that can damage tissues and cause organ failure.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the standard of care in a medical malpractice case?
The standard of care describes how a reasonably prudent provider in the relevant field would act under comparable circumstances.
What is the difference between contributory and comparative negligence?
Contributory negligence can prevent recovery if a patient’s own negligence helped cause the injury. Comparative negligence instead reduces compensation according to fault, sometimes subject to a cutoff.
What does res ipsa loquitur mean in plain English?
It means the circumstances of an injury may themselves support an inference that someone acted negligently. A retained surgical sponge may raise this issue, for instance.
What is a certificate of merit, and do I need one?
Requirements differ by jurisdiction. Maryland generally requires a supporting certificate and report within 90 days after filing the initial claim, subject to exceptions and extensions; Virginia generally requires a signed medical opinion before requesting service, subject to a common-knowledge exception. D.C. generally requires at least 90 days’ notice before suit, a separate requirement from a medical certificate.
Physician-Attorney at the Law Offices of Dr. Michael M. Wilson, M.D., J.D. & Associates Can Answer Your Questions About This Medical Malpractice Glossary
Dr. Michael M. Wilson holds medical and law degrees from Georgetown University, has focused on medical malpractice for more than 30 years, and has recovered more than $100 million in settlements and verdicts. If you have questions about your medical records or a possible claim, please contact us. Call 202-223-4488 or contact us online to schedule a free consultation. We have offices in Washington, D.C., and also serve clients in Northern Virginia and Maryland.
