Patient safety is the cross-cutting concept that links medical malpractice litigation to the broader healthcare system. Every malpractice case is, at one level, a patient safety failure. But not every patient safety failure becomes a malpractice case. Many adverse events are never reported, never investigated, never compensated, and never used to improve the system that produced them.
Ontario’s patient safety framework is fragmented. Hospitals are required to have processes for disclosing critical incidents to patients and to investigate them internally, often through quality-of-care committees whose work is protected from production in litigation by the Quality of Care Information Protection Act, 2016. The Patient Ombudsman investigates complaints about public hospitals, long-term care homes, and home and community care, although the Ombudsman cannot award compensation. The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario investigates complaints about individual physicians. Each forum addresses a different facet of the same underlying problem.
Posts tagged Patient Safety analyze the intersection of these systems with medical malpractice litigation, including disclosure obligations, the scope of statutory protection for quality-of-care work, and policy issues such as wait times, hallway medicine, and the systemic conditions that make individual error more likely.
Most surgical errors are addressed through civil litigation and professional discipline. In rare cases, criminal liability can follow. An honest look at the threshold.
Ontario discipline tribunal grants conditional reinstatement to psychiatrist whose licence was revoked in 2018 for serious professional boundary violations.
A look at the most recent CMPA and CIHI data on medical malpractice, hospital harm, and what the numbers actually say about patient safety in Canada.
A guide for Ontario families on requesting a coroner’s investigation when medical negligence is suspected, what an investigation involves, and how it is used.
A patient’s guide to medication errors in Ontario, including the common error patterns, the high-alert drugs, and what it takes to prove a malpractice claim.
Sepsis is one of medicine’s most time-sensitive diagnoses. When it is missed, the consequences are catastrophic and often preventable.
Most hospital falls are not negligent. Some are. A practical guide to when a fall in hospital becomes a legal claim, and what patients should do next.
Most bad outcomes in medicine are not malpractice. After two decades of these cases in Ontario, here are the signs worth taking seriously.
Free, confidential consultations. Paul reviews every potential case personally and tells you honestly whether it merits investigation.