Douglas Herman is an attorney, chief legal officer, and director of litigation of the Mike Hostilo Law Firm, a firm that focuses on personal injury. His Savannah, Georgia, team has extensive experience in wide-ranging product and premises liability cases. Attorney Douglas Herman’s team also handles complex medical malpractice suits.
Medical malpractice situations typically involve health care providers such as physicians or nurses delivering substandard care, which results in injury or death. Signifiers of malpractice include failure to provide care up to the appropriate standard and committing an omission or negligent act that directly causes bodily injury or harm.
There are four thresholds that the plaintiff must meet in the course of a successful medical malpractice suit. First, they must demonstrate that the duty of care was not met. This means that the physician provide treatment that did not meet accepted medical standards. Second, they must demonstrate breach of duty, in which negligence led to the provision of substandard care.
When it comes to causation, the plaintiff must demonstrate that negligence directly resulted in injury to the patient. This is one of the most complex and challenging areas to navigate, as each person’s situation, condition, and treatment is unique. The final element of the suit focuses on damages, or the specific harm associated with defendant negligence (including physical injury, emotional distress, or financial loss).
Examples of actionable medical malpractice vary widely. They range from surgeries performed on the wrong area of the patients’ bodies to surgical instruments left inside when the incisions were closed. Cases may also look at whether timely or correct diagnosis was not made, despite clear and visible symptoms, leading to a delay in treatment. Other common situations involve mistakes in prescription type and strength, as well as the administration of too much anesthesia, which can lead to brain damage and even mortality.
Major Georgia malpractice cap changes in April 2025 Major Georgia malpractice cap changes take effect in April 2025, as Governor Brian Kemp signed into law substantial tort reform legislation. In 2005, the state legislature limited non-economic damages, such as disability, pain and suffering and loss of quality of life, to $350,000. This drastically restricted the options for awards for those who had suffered life-altering catastrophic injuries. But the Georgia Supreme Court knocked down that limit in 2010.
Atlanta Oculoplastic Surgery v. Nestlehutt centered on a jury award of $900,000 in non-economic damages to a plaintiff whose cosmetic surgery was negligently performed. It ushered in the current situation, wherein Georgia is considered a plaintiff-friendly state for medical malpractice suits.
Senate Bill 68 enacted two major changes. One was that medical expense damages now have a “reasonable value” limit. This addressed what were sometimes referred to as “phantom damages.” In cases where the hospital billed $400,000 for a procedure, but the insurance provider negotiated that down to $100,000, the plaintiff could seek the full $400,000 amount in damages. Today, medical expenses recovery has a firm limit set at the reasonable value of care provided. This is calculated through tabulating the insurance paid, cost written off, and amount owed.
Secondly, the new law places restrictions on pain and suffering arguments, with speculative numbers replaced with figures “rationally related to the evidence.” While this narrows down the specific dollar value of “pain and suffering,” it does not place a cap on such damages. This means that plaintiffs may still seek full compensation for elements such as emotional suffering, physical pain, loss of enjoyment of life, and long-term disability associated with medical malpractice.
