Anesthesia Errors

While the use of anesthesia today is generally considered safe, mistakes caused by medical malpractice can result in serious harm to patients.

Anesthesia errors are often caused by professional negligence. Since these errors are preventable, the medical providers responsible must be held accountable for the patient's pain and suffering, as well as their economic losses.

Anesthesia errors as a result of professional negligence can result in loss of adequate oxygen supply, cardiovascular injury, (including heart attack or stroke), brain damage, spinal cord injury, coma or even death.

The following are some common mistakes made by physicians when administering anesthesia:

• Dangerously prolonged sedation

• Dosage errors: These errors can occur when anesthetic products are improperly labeled, causing the administering of an improper dose of anesthetics, or an excessive dose may be prescribed at the outset

• Delayed anesthesia delivery: This error can be caused by vaporizer leakage, IV errors, syringe-swapping problems, and other mistakes made at the outset of surgery

• Failure to intubate or injury caused during intubation: When an anesthesiologist intubates a patient during surgery to help them breathe safely, errors made may cause serious injury

• Failure to properly monitor a patient: If an anesthesiologist is not responsibly monitoring a patient's level of consciousness during the procedure, causing complications or respiratory distress, serious injury can occur

• Improper or negligent administration of oxygen during surgery

• Failure to recognize complications and promptly react to them

• Defective equipment

• Communication errors before, during or after the procedure

If you or a member of your family is a victim of an anesthesia error, contact the Pittsburgh medical malpractice law firm of Rosen Louik & Perry. Our lawyers are experienced in helping the victims of medical malpractice. If you would like one of our medical malpractice attorneys to review a case involving an anesthesia error, call our office to arrange a free consultation and case evaluation.