Can Nurses be sued?

Actually, nurses can and do become part of lawsuits on a "regular" basis, either by their own hands "errors they personally make" or as part of a healthcare team that is being sued. Nurses can be sued for medication errors, errors in patient care, neglect (intentional or unintentional), for following a physicians orders when they knew they should not, for being part of the care team for a patient who dies as a result of error, etc...That is why nurses, hospitals and doctors carry malpractice insurance. Nurses are responsible for what they do, and for what is done to a patient while they are "in charge" of them. Don't be fooled into thinking that nurses are ANY less responsible than a physician/surgeon, it just is not the case.

that is what i heard... the malpractice insurance, sometimes that is covered under your benefits, sometimes there is a small fee for it

NSO

If you go to this site, this is a very popular liability (Malpractice) site that a lot of nursing professionals and students use, myself included. I will tell you that at least in the state of Florida, even as a student, I am responsible for the care I provide or don't provide for a patient I am taking care of at the time. You should check with your state and school, a lot of schools require students to purchase insurance. Through the NSO it is inexpensive, 36 a YEAR for me, considering the alternative. Medical litigation is not cheap, we are talking millions. I don't know too many students or nurses that have millions just lying around.

It is REALLY easy to get caught up in the "just don't mess up" type of thinking, but trust me, even as a student, especially when you start passing meds, stuff happens. You can easily get side-tracked, you are remembering all the steps you were taught, recalling med dosages and so on and so on. Even in the smaller things, stuff happens. No it isn't all life-threatening but it is stuff and it does happen.

My advice is better safe than sorry!

Nurses can absolutely be sued! That's why we have to document document document! Maybe try to google search that. In my nursing class, our instructor has given us articles where nurses have been successfully sued. Many nurses are covered under their employer and carry additional insurance they pay for themselves.

As a nurse who has been through a lawsuit, I can vouch for the fact that nurses can be sued. Not only can they be sued, but they can lose their livelihood over a lawsuit, whether or not they were guilty of any infraction. Malpractice insurance helps with some of the expenses associated with a lawsuit and/or defending oneself with the nursing board, but it doesn't make up for the loss of a job and loss of one's professional reputation.

Okay, I'm not a nurse, so I don't know for sure. But, on the movie "Awake" (which I realize is not an accurate source of information but hey I figured I would offer my input anyway) the nurse owed millions of dollars from a malpractice suit. I think that you can purchase malpractice insurance but it probably does not cover EVERYTHING. Also, I believe that if a mistake is made, the entire medical team is held responsible, not just the doctor. But like I said, I don't know for sure. I just watched "Awake".

As a paralegal I can tell you anyone can file a suit whether they have standing and can prove their case is another story. Being a nurse does not preclude you from being sued.

Working as a nurse under the direction of a doctor is similar in a some ways to working as a paralegal under the direction of an attorney. Ultimately if I do something while I'm working under an attorney it is the attorney's license on the line along with my CP certification and state registration and their malpractice will cover the error; however, if I do something outside or beyond my scope of practice or employment, I now become personally liable.

Either way when it comes to recovering damages, a person will sue anyone involved in an incident in order to cover all possibilities of recovery. (This will go as far as suing the president of the corporation who owns a hospital. Even though that person seems so far removed from an error made by a nurse, he still is an avenue of recovery.)

Tort law is very interesting this way. Law isn't a science; much of it is a matter of interpretation. And every torteous act has it's own little nuances.

So, can you be sued? As everyone else has said, yes. But then, so can the maintenance man when he forgets to dry a wet spot on the floor and a patient slips and falls, along with the nurse (Why wasn't the nurse assisting the patient to the bathroom, when the patient called for her 3 times?), the doctor (why didn't the pt have a foley?), the hospital (what was the procedure of the hospital with wet floors, etc?), and so on. There are a lot more angles to this situation, but I think you get the idea. Nobody, absolutely nobody, is immune to litigation.

My husband is a paramedic, and we deal with this all the time. My husband gets pts on the rescue car broken already, but every aspect of what he and the crew does is under a microscope when litigation begins. They sue the city, the doctors, the hospital, the nurses, medics, the flight crew (helicopter), the heli company, anyone they can attempt to recover from, and those are just after medical care has begun. This doesn't mention anyone who may have been the initial cause of the pt needing treatment.

I go round and round with this all the time. I personally hate PI/tort work, but I understand there really is no other form of recovery in our society. I mean we cannot bring the dead back, we cannot take away someone's pain and put it on the person who caused it; so, this is the system we have. Being afraid of being sued all the time, is no way to gauge your willingness or hesitation to enter a profession.

I had a professor once say, "If you always do the right thing, you'll never do the wrong thing." I believe in that statement so much. It's about CYA'ing yourself and doing the right thing, whatever it may be.

And if you do get sued, personally questioning what you did or didn't do is completely reasonable. Wanting to always be better and improve makes you and your profession better. This, IMO, is what makes the legal system good. Putting people on notice and nudging them to make a change has over the course of history made things better; unfortunately, sometimes it takes a jury of your peers to make you see the light.

Okay, nuff said. I am probably conjuring up a lot of angst by those who hate lawyers and the rest. Sorry, I just work for them. LOL.

Liz

lets put it this way. If the doctor prescribes an incorrect dose of medicine and you administer the med. You, the nurse, are responsible. So basically you have to catch any mistake that the dr, pharmacy, etc. makes

Liz,

Thank you for taking the time to explain that to us.
Poliwog