Quality of Care and Your Client

Written By:
Paulette Campbell RN-BC, BSN, MJ
Certified Legal Nurse Consultant

Research on juries has shown that many times what tips their decision in finding for a plaintiff client is not whether duty was breached or standards of care were not met. Instead, juries most often make their decision based on if they feel that there was more that should have been done for the patient. If plaintiff counsel can lead a jury to feeling like the patient was not cared for completely, regardless of standards or duty – a jury is likely to find in their favor.

This of course is not to suggest that issues of duty and standards of care should be ignored when presenting an argument to the jury. This, however, definitely suggests that a defense can be bolstered by helping the jury to understand the quality of care that was provided to a patient. Not an easy task – and for a variety of reasons. First, when a healthcare professional finds themselves having to defend their actions how they provided quality care is often forgotten. Instead, they naturally focus on how they met standards and how others would have done the same. Further, many times healthcare professionals while they naturally give quality care do not think of themselves as doing anything besides what they were supposed to do.

For example, an experienced RN who has an excellent reputation with colleagues, physicians, administration and even most patients now finds herself named in a lawsuit. She is confused, upset and shaken. The excellent care that she provides everyday she does not really have a name for – especially a term like “quality of care initiative”. To speak highly about the care she provides is not what she is used to doing. When questioned about the care provided her first reaction is likely to go to the protocols in the unit and review them. She will stand by the fact that she followed the protocols precisely and her actions were correct. However, she will miss the opportunity to present to the jury that fact, that not only did she follow the protocols and standards but the quality of care that she provided – would that be the type of care that any member of the jury would want. Even though something went wrong, it was not because she did not follow standards, it was not because she ignored protocol and it was not because she did not provide care in a manner that would be acceptable to all.

So, how does quality of care get communicated? First, by helping to make your clients look beyond their standards and protocols but also to speak to how they approach some of the intangibles of the care they provide. So, for example, if an infection is in question – how does the healthcare professional approach their patients with the idea of preventing them from getting an infection? If it is a bedsore, what are the little things that they do to reposition the patient? It can be easily taken for granted that the quality of care being performed by one healthcare professional is the same as care provided by everyone else.

Our medical record reviews and interactions with your clients can help you get at the core regarding quality of care issues. Our research can help you better understand what are the latest quality of care issues that are applicable to your case. Our involvement in your case will go beyond just services of medical record review, research and communication. We will look at solutions like how to best identify quality of care issues, how to speak to the quality of care that was provided and how to help the jury understand that patient factors contributed to the end result. For more information regarding our solutions, you can contact our offices at info@medicaljurisprudence.com or call 630-551-0978.