41% of Psychiatrists Have Been Sued. Do You Have a Case?

August 3, 2022

According to a 2020 article in Clinical Psychiatry News, “Forty-one percent of U.S. psychiatrists have been sued for malpractice at least once.”

The top reason for the legal action was wrongful death (31%), followed by poor outcome/disease progression (23%), failure to treat/delayed treatment (11%), errors in medication administration (10%), and complications from treatment/surgery (8%).

Only 7% of psychiatrists said failure to treat/delayed treatment was the reason for the lawsuit, whereas this was the top reason for physicians overall (33%) in the report.

Importantly, the majority of psychiatrists who responded to the survey indicated that they carry malpractice insurance.

What You Should Do Now:

If you or a family member have been a patient of a psychiatrist and ended the relationship due to any off the following (this list is NOT exhaustive), you may have a cause of action and we should speak right away to see if you can get satisfaction through the judicial system:

• Failing to diagnose a condition properly or prescribe correct medications
• A wrongful death occurred and the psychiatrist did not conduct a proper suicide risk assessment and/or try to reasonably prevent the death
• Violating rules of patient confidentiality
• Engaging in sexual activity
• Threatening you
• Failing to treat you in a timely manner, causing harm
• Failing to warn third parties of threats from the doctor’s patients as required by state law

Please contact attorney Steven Barrett with any questions you may have about your potential case at (215) 661-0400 or [email protected] as soon as possible.

Source: “41% of Psychiatrists Have Been Sued: Do you have a case?,” Hamburg, Rubin, Mullin, Maxwell & Lupin, PC, Jan 7, 2021. URL: https://www.hrmml.com/client-alert/41-of-psychiatrists-have-been-sued-do-you-have-a-case