Emergency Rooms Administering Pain Medications or Sedatives to An Intoxicated Patient

When patients are brought into an emergency room with signs of intoxication or drug use, it is important for doctors to carefully test for the presence of alcohol and other drugs before administrating any drug therapies. If the patient is intoxicated or has been taking any illegal substances or prescription medication, additional drugs or substances can easily interact with the substances already in their bloodstream, causing potentially dangerous or even fatal interactions. When patients are intoxicated, administering pain medications or sedatives, especially, can be dangerous. Alcohol and some other drugs can magnify the effects of sedatives and some pain medications and can cause serious interactions that can leave a patient with life-threatening injuries.

While emergency rooms are often hectic environments and medical professionals need to make very rapid decisions, it is also important that medical professionals take all needed precautions to keep patients safe. This may mean testing a patient for possible intoxication before administering pain medications, sedatives, or other drugs that may interact with existing drugs in the patient's bloodstream. If you have been injured due to incorrect medication in a hospital setting, contact the Flaxman Law Group to find out about your rights. You may be able to file a medical malpractice claim or emergency room negligence claim in Miami or your community. Compensation for your claim can help pay for your pain and suffering, medical costs, lost wages, and other expenses.

Emergency rooms are often very hectic environments, and medication errors can occur for a number of reasons:

• understaffing
• poor hospital policy
• poor staff training
• lack of patient monitoring
• failure to run appropriate tests
• lab errors
• pharmacy errors
• misdiagnoses
• patient record mix-ups
• mislabeling of patient records or medications

No matter why medication errors occur, it is important for emergency room staff to make reasonable efforts to check to see whether a patient is intoxicated or is using controlled substances or prescription drugs before administering any medication that may interact with alcohol or other substances in the patient's bloodstream. If you have been injured after being given the wrong drug in an emergency room, you could face serious complications. These types of errors can cause prolonged treatment, complications, permanent injury, brain injury, fatalities, and many more negative outcomes. If you have been affected, you may be able to pursue a personal injury claim in Miami or your community in order to get compensation to help pay for some of these costs. Pursuing compensation can also ensure that medical staff are held liable and that important safety changes are made so that other patients do not have to suffer the same way.

Are you looking for a medical malpractice attorney in Miami or your community? The Flaxman Law Group has been part of the South Florida community for more than 25 years. The legal staff has helped thousands of people recover more than $25 million in total compensation for their injuries. The Flaxman Law Group legal team has extensive experience negotiating with insurance providers, working with investigators and medical expert witnesses, and aggressively pursuing patient rights in and out of the courtroom. If you would like a strong and compassionate advocate by your side, contact the Flaxman Law Group for a free case evaluation and legal advice about your specific situation. Your initial consultation is absolutely free and comes with no obligation, so you risk nothing by getting the facts about your situation.