Patient’s Fall: Not A Case Of Professional Negligence.
Legal Eagle Eye Newsletter for the Nursing Profession
November 2016
The fact the patient fell while being assisted by a registered nurse does not make this a case of professional negligence requiring expert testimony on the standard of care. Individuals with no medical training whatsoever often push others in wheelchairs and assist them in exiting them. COURT OF APPEALS OF GEORGIA October 4, 2016
The patient was at the hospital for preoperative testing for a procedure scheduled the next day. The patient used a cane. A wheelchair was used by a nurse to take her to the treatment room where she stood up and got back into the wheelchair independently. All the time the foot pedals were down. As the nurse was pushing the patient back to the waiting room they came to a doorway too narrow for the wheelchair. The nurse asked if the patient could get up and walk the rest of the way on her own. She said she could. The patient had her cane in one hand and pushed up from the wheelchair armrest with the other. As the patient stood up her pant leg caught a foot pedal that was still down. She fell and broke her leg. She needed surgery and three months in rehab.
The Court of Appeals of Georgia ruled the patient did not need expert testimony for her case to go forward. The hospital admitted that an employee who happened to be a registered nurse did not follow the wheelchair manufacturer’s directions for the foot pedals to be up in the raised position for the patient to arise from sitting in the wheelchair. That was sufficient evidence in the Court’s judgment.
Byrom v. Douglas, __ S.E.2d __, 2016 WL 5799114 (Ga. App., October 4, 2016).More from nursinglaw.com
http://www.nursinglaw.com/patient-fall-liability.htm
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http://www.nursinglaw.com/patient-fall-hospital.htm
http://www.nursinglaw.com/fallfrombed.htm