Connecticut Medication Error Lawyer

A medication error is any preventable mistake in the prescribing, dispensing, administering, or monitoring of a drug that causes harm to a patient. Medication errors happen in every clinical setting: hospitals, surgery centers, doctor's offices, urgent care clinics, pharmacies, nursing homes, and at home when patients are given incorrect instructions on discharge. The error can be the fault of a physician, a pharmacist, a nurse, a pharmacy technician, a hospital system, or some combination.

Not every adverse drug reaction is a medication error, and not every medication error is malpractice. Some medications carry serious risks even when prescribed and administered correctly. A medication error rises to the level of malpractice only when a medical professional or institution fails to meet the accepted standard of care and that failure causes the patient harm.

The standard of care for medication administration is rigorous and well-established. It is built around what nurses and pharmacists are trained to call the "five rights": the right patient, the right drug, the right dose, the right route, and the right time. Each of those checks is meant to catch errors before they reach the patient. The standard also requires that a medical professional take a complete medication history before prescribing, screen for allergies and interactions, communicate clearly with patients and other providers, verify orders before administering, and monitor patients for adverse effects after a medication is given. Hospitals and pharmacies are responsible for maintaining systems (electronic verification, barcoding, double-check protocols) designed to catch errors before they cause harm. When those systems fail, or when individual providers fail to follow them, the result is often catastrophic.

The firm has handled medication error cases involving virtually every category of drug and every kind of care setting. The most common types of errors fall into three groups.

Improper Dosage

Dosing errors are among the most common and most dangerous medication errors. They include administering too much of a drug (overdose), administering too little of a drug (underdose), and administering the same drug too often or for too long. Some dosing errors are decimal-point mistakes that result in tenfold or hundredfold differences from what was prescribed. Others involve weight-based dosing miscalculations, particularly in children. Still others involve chemotherapy and other high-risk medications where the correct dose is the difference between treatment and harm. Underdosing can be just as dangerous as overdosing, particularly with cancer treatments and antibiotics, where inadequate dosing can allow a serious disease to progress untreated.

Wrong Medication

Wrong-medication errors include dispensing or administering a drug different from what was prescribed, confusing two medications with similar names or similar packaging, and giving a medication to the wrong patient. Look-alike and sound-alike drug name confusion is a well-recognized source of error in hospitals and pharmacies, and pharmacy and hospital protocols are supposed to guard against it. Wrong-medication errors can also include administering a drug by the wrong route, such as giving an intravenous medication orally or vice versa, which can fundamentally change how the drug acts in the body.

Harmful Interaction

Many medications interact dangerously with other medications, with certain foods, or with conditions the patient already has. A medical professional prescribing a new drug is responsible for reviewing the patient's current medication list, checking for known interactions, and adjusting the prescription accordingly. Pharmacists have an independent duty to screen prescriptions against the patient's medication profile and flag concerns. When these checks fail and a patient receives a contraindicated medication, the consequences can include internal bleeding, kidney failure, dangerous changes in heart rhythm, severe allergic reactions, and death.

Medication errors often involve multiple parties and multiple points of failure. Liability may rest with any combination of the following:

The prescribing physician can be liable for ordering the wrong drug, the wrong dose, or a drug contraindicated by the patient's existing medications or conditions, and for failing to communicate clear instructions.

The pharmacist can be liable for dispensing a different drug or different dose than the one prescribed, for failing to catch a clear interaction or contraindication, and for failing to counsel the patient appropriately.

The nurse or other medical professional administering a medication can be liable for administering the wrong drug, the wrong dose, or by the wrong route, and for failing to verify the order before giving the medication.

The hospital can be liable both for the negligence of its employees (vicarious liability) and for its own institutional failures, including understaffing, inadequate training, broken communication between providers, and failure to maintain effective safety protocols.

The pharmaceutical manufacturer can be liable when an error results from defective drug packaging, inadequate warnings, mislabeling, or manufacturing errors that cause the wrong dose or wrong drug to be supplied.

Identifying every responsible party is essential to a successful recovery, and it requires careful investigation by attorneys who understand how medication errors actually occur.

Medication error cases require lawyers who understand both medicine and pharmacology, who work routinely with the leading experts in both fields, and who have the resources to prosecute a complex case against well-defended hospital and pharmacy defendants. SGT has the depth and experience these cases demand.

When a Connecticut medication error lawyer at SGT accepts a case, the firm obtains the complete medical and pharmacy records, consults with leading specialists about the applicable standard of care, reconstructs the chain of events at every point from prescription through administration, and identifies every party whose conduct contributed to the harm. 

Connecticut's statute of limitations for medical malpractice, including medication error cases, is two years from the date the injury was discovered, or reasonably should have been discovered, with an absolute outside limit of three years from the date of the negligent act. Different rules can apply when an injury was concealed or when the harm arises from a course of continuing treatment.

The statute of limitations for a product liability claim against a pharmaceutical manufacturer is three years from the date the injury was discovered, or reasonably should have been discovered, and no more than 10 years after the manufacturer last parted with possession or control of the product.

Because these deadlines are strict and the pre-suit opinion letter requirement takes time to satisfy, families should contact a Connecticut medication error lawyer as soon as they suspect that a medication error has caused serious harm.

Connecticut law allows victims of medication errors to recover both economic and non-economic damages. Economic damages cover quantifiable financial losses: past and future medical expenses, the cost of long-term or lifetime care, lost wages, and lost earning capacity. Non-economic damages compensate for pain and suffering, emotional distress, disfigurement, loss of enjoyment of life, and loss of consortium for spouses and family members. In wrongful-death cases, damages may include the decedent's pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, lost wages and lost earning capacity. Connecticut does not cap compensatory damages in medical malpractice cases.