Articles & Insights
Articles
Guides from Peter Anderson on the questions patients and families actually ask. Written for non-lawyers, drawn from 15+ years of trial experience.
Understanding Medical Malpractice: Your Rights as a Patient
What medical malpractice actually is, the four elements you have to prove, how the standard of care works, and how to tell whether what happened to you might be a viable claim.
FTCA Claims: Suing the Government for Medical Negligence
How Federal Tort Claims Act cases work, why most personal injury firms won't take them, and the procedural traps that end most claims before they reach a courtroom.
Birth Injuries: What the Fetal Monitor Strip Actually Shows
Most birth injury cases turn on the electronic fetal monitor strip. Here is what the strip actually shows, how the three-tier NICHD categorization works, what the new 2025 ACOG guideline changed, and why a child's lifetime needs drive the value of these cases.
Nursing Home Abuse and the Understaffing Problem
Most nursing home injuries are not the work of bad individuals. They are the predictable result of facilities that operate with too few staff for too many residents. Here is what to look for, what federal regulations require, and why the staffing data has become the most important evidence in these cases.
Surgical Errors: Wrong-Site Surgery, Retained Objects, and Post-Op Failures
Surgical errors fall into two broad categories: the dramatic "never events" that should be impossible with proper systems, and the quieter post-operative failures that account for most of the actual harm. Here is what each looks like in the chart.
Diagnostic Errors: When Hours Decide Whether You Live
Diagnostic mistakes cluster around the conditions where they cause the most harm: cancer, stroke, heart attack, and sepsis. Sepsis is the clearest example. Here is what the evidence actually says about how fast antibiotics need to start and what the medical record has to show.
EMR Audit Trails: What Electronic Records Actually Reveal
Modern EHRs log every click. In medical malpractice litigation, audit trails routinely catch backdated entries, copy-forwarded notes, and the time a critical lab result was viewed without anyone acting on it. Here is what hospitals record, what you can get in discovery, and what it shows.
Expert Witnesses: Who They Are, What They Cost, and Why They Decide Cases
Medical malpractice cases live or die on expert testimony. The right expert at $1,200 per hour can win a case the defense thought was unbeatable. The wrong expert can lose a case the chart appeared to win. Here is how the system actually works.
Statute of Limitations: Time Limits for Medical Malpractice Claims
Medical malpractice deadlines are among the strictest in civil law. Here's how the discovery rule works, how statutes of repose can override it, and what the current rules look like in DC, Maryland, Virginia, and FTCA cases.
Medication Errors: Where They Happen and Who Is Responsible
A medication error can happen at any of five steps: prescribing, transcribing, dispensing, administering, and monitoring. Liability often involves multiple defendants: the prescribing physician, the dispensing pharmacy, the administering nurse. Here is how the chain breaks down.
Emergency Room Negligence: Triage Failures, Missed Diagnoses, and EMTALA
Emergency rooms operate at the intersection of high acuity, time pressure, and incomplete information. Most ER malpractice cases trace to one of three patterns: triage that misclassified the patient, atypical presentations missed by the workup, or premature discharge of a patient who was not stable.
Hospital-Acquired Infections: The Prevention Bundles That Matter
CLABSI, CAUTI, surgical site infections, and ventilator-associated pneumonia each have well-established prevention bundles. When a hospital-acquired infection causes serious harm, the litigation question is whether the bundle was followed and whether the nursing record proves it.
Choosing a Medical Malpractice Attorney: What Actually Matters
Most legal advertising looks the same. Behind it, malpractice firms vary enormously in experience, expert network, financial capacity, and willingness to try cases. Here is what to ask and what to look for.
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