I have a question pertaining to medical malpractice, cancer and looking for a knowledgeable medical malpractice lawyer I have a child who is six years old with the rear blood disease that is cancerous who has been receiving chemotherapy. The chemotherapy has been administered by a nurse that comes to our house, at the direction of my child oncologist. It has come to light that numerous mistakes have been made in the administration of the chemotherapy to my child, the nurse practitioner administering the chemotherapy has even admitted to these mistakes. The mistake was for three months my child has been given the incorrect dosage of chemotherapy, in fact he was given approximately 10% of the drugs he was supposed to be administered. The original mistake came from the pharmacist, who had provided the wrong dosage. I have verified with my primary care physician and the oncologist, both agree that the prescription was correct. The doctor has informed me that it is the nurse’s job who is administering the chemotherapy to verify that the dosage being provided by the pharmacist is the same dosage that the oncologist was prescribing. I’m not sure who to file a lawsuit against or even if there’s a lawsuit available in a situation such as this. Considering this is gone on for three months in the course of treatment is only six months, this is severely affected his treatment. Who was at fault? Is there a medical malpractice case against the doctor? Is there medical malpractice case against the nurse? Is there medical malpractice case against the pharmacist?

ANSWER:

You certainly have a case for medical malpractice from the fact that you presented me.  In fact, you have two separate cases of medical malpractice or medical negligence in your son situation. The first instant of medical malpractice was that the pharmacist mistakenly provided your son with only one 10th of the dosage requirement that was prescribed by the oncologist. The second medical malpractice or medical negligence case is against the nurse practitioner who went your home and for three months never verified that the prescription given by the pharmacist, matched the dosage requirements prescribed by the oncologist. These are two separate and distinct lawsuits, they should not be put into one lawsuit. The pharmacist should’ve properly verified that the dosage prescribed by the doctor, was the dosage that was sent to be administered to your son. Next the administering nurse practitioner had a responsibility to verify the doctor’s orders and to check them against what the pharmacy had sent over to be administered. It sounds like all she did was take the bag out of the box that UPS sent hung it up stuck a needle in your child’s arm and probably went to texting on her phone. It is the nurses duty to verify the doctor’s orders and what the pharmacist sends are one in the same, prior to administering chemotherapy.

Joseph F. Botelho, Esq.

BOTELHO LAW GROUP
Attorneys At Law

901 Eastern Ave.
Unit 2
Fall River, MA 02723

Office:  888-269-0688

Botelho Law Group