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Negligence

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Negligence
In today’s busy health care industry nurses and doctors are pushed to the limit. We are asked to make life and death decisions in mere seconds. Society is also more aware of what they should expect from health care providers. This awareness demands health care providers not only provide excellent care, but also document the care they provide to ensure they are not subject to accusations of negligence, or gross negligence that can lead to malpractice suits. This paper will differentiate between negligence, gross negligence, and malpractice. In order to further examine these issues an article titled “Amputation mishap, negligence cited” from The Neighborhood News in which “Earlier this week, 62-year-old Joseph Benson underwent an amputation of his leg just below the left knee and only suffered one complication- the wrong leg was amputated” (Lowell, n.d.) will be discussed. This will include the determination of whether or not this example is a case for negligence, gross negligence, or malpractice. This discussion will also include the importance of documentation and its correlation to potential negligence, the ethical principles I would use to guide my practice in this situation, and how I would document to satisfy ethical and legal requirements.
Most people do not understand the distinction between negligence, gross negligence, and malpractice. According to Guido (2010), a plaintiff must prove that there was a duty to the patient, that a breach of the duty owed to the patient occurred, that an injury resulted because of the breach, that this injury was foreseeable, and that damages resulted in order to win a malpractice or negligence case. “Negligence is a general term that denote conduct lacking in due care, thus, negligence equates carelessness” (Guido, 2010, p. 92). Negligence can also be described as “an unintentional tort alleged when one may have

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