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Dental malpractice occurs when a dentist fails to provide reasonable care, resulting in injury or harm to the patient. Negligence laws vary by jurisdiction, but dentists are expected to follow industry standards and guidelines. Malpractice insurance can cover the costs of a lawsuit.
Dental malpractice, like all forms of malpractice, results from the failure to exercise reasonable care. Negligence is an aspect of tort law. The specifics of what is required to prove negligence vary by jurisdiction, but the general premise is that a person has not acted with care and according to standards that society at large would consider reasonable. In dentistry, malpractice usually refers to treatments gone wrong, misdiagnoses, or injuries caused by failure to follow certain industry best practices. Any failure of a dentist to provide safe and standard care can constitute dental malpractice.
Not all dental injuries have their roots in dental malpractice. The negligence law does not penalize unavoidable damage or injury sustained despite the dentist’s best efforts. A dentist can only be liable for negligence if they somehow acted in a way that was below the reasonably expected standard, or if they acted in violation of industry guidelines or regulations.
Dentists are medical professionals and as such are held to certain expected standards of care. They are expected to correctly diagnose dental conditions, for example, and to accurately complete all dental procedures. Carrying out examinations and surgeries and prescribing appropriate and reasonable medications and home treatments are all within the purview of dentists. Failure in these or other areas can open a dentist to a dental malpractice lawsuit.
There are many types of malpractice and any dentist can sometimes be a malpractice dentist. Most malpractice cases are characterized by an injury to the patient. A patient experiencing immense pain after a routine dental procedure or a patient who feels that a dental condition has not been adequately treated can hire a dental malpractice attorney to investigate the possibility of suing for dental malpractice. An attorney considering such a case will try to understand the nature of the patient’s suffering and to discern the cause. If the lawsuit was related to some action or inaction on the part of the dentist, there may be grounds for a malpractice lawsuit.
Most of the time, dental malpractice cases are brought as dental malpractice cases. Most jurisdictions include malpractice within medical malpractice. Regardless of the theory under which the case is brought, however, it will focus on the failure to provide competent or otherwise reasonable care at a specific time. Because mistakes happen and dentists are sometimes wrong, dentists usually have malpractice insurance that will cover the costs of a malpractice lawsuit and indemnify the dentist against any personal liability. Malpractice insurance is typically quite expensive to maintain and becomes more so the more a dentist is accused of malpractice.
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