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Injured by Medical Negligence in Quincy? Our Attorneys Can Help
Our Quincy medical malpractice lawyers represent patients who suffered injuries because of negligent diagnosis, surgery, medication, or other medical treatment.
A delayed stroke diagnosis, surgical mistake, or failure to monitor a deteriorating patient can cause permanent disability, further medical treatment, or death.
Under Massachusetts law, patients may have a claim when a healthcare provider fails to meet the professional standard of care and causes injury. An unfavorable outcome alone does not establish malpractice.
At Marasco & Nesselbush, we investigate treatment decisions, review medical evidence with qualified experts, and pursue claims supported by the facts.
If you suspect medical negligence caused an injury, contact Marasco & Nesselbush for a free consultation today.
Marasco & Nesselbush: Representing Injured Patients Since 1999
Founded in 1999, Marasco & Nesselbush is a personal injury law firm that has recovered more than $500 million for clients across its practice areas. Our attorneys have more than 350 years of combined legal experience representing injured clients.
Our Quincy office at 234 Copeland Street, Suite 210, serves patients and family members throughout Norfolk County and the South Shore. We offer free consultations and client assistance in English and Spanish.
Our experienced medical malpractice attorneys include:
- Jane R. Duket: A firm partner admitted in Massachusetts and Rhode Island who concentrates on personal injury and medical malpractice. She represented the plaintiff in the firm’s $7.27 million Massachusetts medical negligence verdict.
- Mark H. Grimm: A firm partner admitted in Massachusetts with more than 40 years of legal experience. He tried the $7.27 million case alongside Duket and has handled malpractice claims involving surgical injuries and delayed treatment.
- Douglas E. Chabot: An attorney in the firm’s personal injury and medical malpractice practice group with more than 14 years of experience in personal injury matters. He also worked on the firm’s $1.35 million Massachusetts birth injury settlement.
We handle qualifying medical malpractice claims on a contingency fee basis, subject to Massachusetts fee limits. Our written agreement explains attorney fees and case expenses, including what happens if there is no recovery.
Why Quincy Medical Malpractice Clients Choose Marasco & Nesselbush
Medical malpractice claims require evidence of what a reasonably competent medical professional would have done under similar circumstances and whether different care would have prevented or reduced the injury.
Our attorneys combine medical record review with local knowledge of the Massachusetts court system. We consult qualified specialists and assess presuit notice, tribunal requirements, and filing deadlines.
Our representation includes:
- Trial experience: Our trial lawyers, Jane Duket and Mark Grimm, obtained a Massachusetts medical negligence verdict involving failures in diagnosis, physician communication, and treatment.
- Record investigation: We begin gathering evidence by reviewing clinical notes, nursing observations, imaging, laboratory results, medication records, and hospital communications.
- Medical experts: Qualified specialists help assess the standard of care, causation, and future treatment needs when appropriate.
- Serious injury claims: We document additional treatment, lost income, and lasting impairments that affect work and daily activities.
- Litigation: We prepare claims for court when the evidence supports a case that cannot be resolved through settlement.
Our Medical Malpractice Attorneys Have Obtained Significant Recoveries
Our published case results include recoveries involving delayed diagnosis, surgical negligence, and hospital care.
Our results include two Massachusetts medical negligence cases and another significant surgical negligence recovery:
- $7.27 million Massachusetts jury verdict: Jane Duket and Mark Grimm represented a woman who suffered permanent neurological injuries after delays in diagnosing and treating neurosarcoidosis. The jury found that inadequate communication procedures contributed to her stroke.
- $1.35 million Massachusetts settlement: Mark Grimm, Jane Duket, and Douglas Chabot represented the family in a birth injury case involving the death of a 10-month-old child.
- $8.49 million recovery: Obtained in a surgical negligence case involving an avoidable amputation after knee replacement surgery.
Past results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Each claim depends on its facts, supporting medical evidence, and applicable law.
Injured and not sure what your case is worth? Find out for free.
What Is Medical Malpractice Under Massachusetts Law?
Medical malpractice occurs when a doctor or another health care provider fails to exercise the care and skill expected of a reasonably competent medical professional in the relevant field under similar circumstances, causing a patient injury.
The standard depends on the specialty and the information available when treatment decisions were made. Failing to investigate suspicious imaging, order indicated cancer testing, or recognize stroke symptoms may constitute negligence if it causes injury.
Complications can arise despite appropriate care. Even where preventable mistakes occurred, a claim requires evidence connecting a departure from the professional standard to an injury or worsening condition.
Can a Known Medical Complication Still Support a Claim?
Yes. A recognized complication may still support a claim when negligent treatment caused it or an unreasonable response made the injury worse.
For example, bleeding after surgery may occur without negligence, but failure to investigate dangerous changes in vital signs may cause additional harm.
Common Types of Medical Malpractice in Quincy
Preventable medical mistakes may involve diagnosis, surgery, medication, or failures to respond to a patient’s deteriorating condition. The medical evidence must still establish whether a mistake caused additional harm.
A review of 551 Massachusetts primary-care malpractice claims closed in 2005–2009 found that 72.1% involved allegations of diagnostic error. The finding concerns that historical group, not all Massachusetts malpractice claims.
Medical errors that may support a claim include:
- Missed or delayed diagnosis: Failing to investigate abnormal results, recognize stroke symptoms, evaluate possible breast cancer, or communicate critical test findings.
- Surgical errors: Operating at the wrong site, negligently damaging an organ or nerve, leaving a foreign object inside the patient, or failing to respond to surgical complications.
- Birth injuries: Delaying necessary intervention for fetal distress, misusing delivery instruments, or failing to respond to maternal emergencies when those decisions cause preventable injuries. Birth injury cases may involve cerebral palsy or other serious diagnoses, but a diagnosis alone does not establish that negligent care caused the condition.
- Medication errors: Prescribing or administering the wrong medication or dose, overlooking documented allergies, or failing to address dangerous drug interactions.
- Anesthesia errors: Inadequate airway management, incorrect medication administration, or failure to respond to dangerous changes in breathing and vital signs.
- Infection and sepsis-related negligence: Failing to recognize or treat a worsening infection or to monitor a patient showing signs of sepsis.
- Hospital monitoring and discharge failures: Failing to respond to changes in a patient’s condition, communicate critical information between providers, or arrange appropriate follow-up care.
- Informed consent failures: Omitting material risk information that would have changed the patient’s treatment decision, where the undisclosed risk caused injury.
Who May Be Responsible for Negligent Medical Care?
When several medical providers are involved, we examine the roles of physicians, nurses, and other health care providers. Liability depends on each provider’s responsibilities and conduct.
Potentially responsible parties include:
- Doctors and surgeons: Negligent diagnoses, treatment decisions, surgical procedures, prescribing, or postoperative care.
- Registered nurses and clinical staff: Medication administration mistakes, failures to properly monitor patients, or failures to report deteriorating conditions.
- Hospitals and medical centers: Negligence by employed healthcare providers or institutional failures involving staffing, supervision, communication, or clinical protocols.
- Laboratories and imaging services: Errors in testing, interpreting results, or communicating findings that affect diagnosis or treatment.
- Pharmacists and pharmacies: Dispensing the wrong medication or making another medication-related error that causes injury.
A hospital may be responsible for employees’ negligence or its own institutional failures, but it is not automatically liable for every independent physician treating patients there. Employment and agency relationships must be examined.
Some federally supported health centers fall under the Federal Tort Claims Act. Claims involving covered providers generally require an administrative claim before a federal lawsuit and follow different deadlines.
Proving Medical Negligence in Massachusetts
A medical malpractice claim must connect negligent treatment to a compensable injury or, in qualifying cases, a lost chance of a better medical outcome.
The main elements are:
- Duty of care: A professional duty existed between the provider and patient.
- Breach: The provider failed to act as a reasonably competent practitioner would under the circumstances.
- Causation: The departure from appropriate care caused or contributed to the claimed injury.
- Damages: The patient suffered harm, such as additional medical treatment, lost earnings, disability, or pain and suffering.
Expert witness testimony is generally important to establish the clinical standard, explain the departures from that standard, and address causation. An expert must be qualified in the relevant medical subject, but Massachusetts does not impose a universal rule requiring the same board certification as the defendant.
What if the Patient Was Already Seriously Ill?
Existing medical conditions do not eliminate a malpractice claim, but medical evidence must distinguish the illness’s effects from additional harm caused by negligent treatment.
Massachusetts recognizes loss-of-chance claims when medical negligence reduces a patient’s chance of survival or a better outcome. The lost opportunity must be established with medical evidence, and damages are assessed differently from claims that negligence caused the entire injury.
Massachusetts Medical Malpractice Laws and Filing Requirements
Massachusetts medical malpractice claims can involve presuit notice, tribunal screening, filing deadlines, and restrictions on certain damages and fees.
Three-Year Filing Deadline and Seven-Year Statute of Repose
Under Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 260, Section 4, covered medical malpractice lawsuits generally must be filed within three years after the claim accrues. Missing an applicable deadline can result in losing the right to sue.
A claim may accrue when the patient knew or reasonably should have known that an injury was caused by the provider’s conduct, rather than necessarily on the treatment date. Continued treatment by the same provider may affect accrual in limited circumstances.
A separate seven-year statute of repose generally runs from the alleged negligent act or omission, with a statutory exception for a foreign object left inside the body. Continued treatment does not, by itself, remove that outer limit.
Under Chapter 231, Section 60D, claims involving minors have special rules. A child younger than six when the claim accrues may have until the ninth birthday, subject to the seven-year repose period and its foreign-object exception.
For wrongful death claims, Chapter 229, Section 2 generally provides three years from death or from when the executor or administrator knew or reasonably should have known the factual basis for the claim.
Presuit Notice of a Medical Malpractice Claim
Chapter 231, Section 60L generally requires 182 days’ written notice to a covered health care provider before a medical malpractice lawsuit begins.
The notice must describe the factual basis of the claim, the alleged standard of care, how that standard was breached, the action allegedly required, and the connection to the injury. The statute also governs access to relevant medical records and a response from the provider.
The notice period is shortened to 90 days in specified circumstances involving providers added after notice or litigation has begun against another provider involved in the claim. Notice is also excused in certain cases involving defendants who could not reasonably have been identified before filing.
A lawsuit filed within six months of the limitations deadline or one year of the repose deadline is exempt from Section 60L notice. Earlier filing may also be allowed if the provider declines settlement in writing or fails to respond within 150 days after receiving notice.
Massachusetts Medical Malpractice Tribunal Rules
Chapter 231, Section 60B provides for preliminary screening of malpractice claims. A tribunal generally consists of a Superior Court judge, a Massachusetts-licensed physician, and a Massachusetts attorney.
The tribunal examines an offer of proof to decide whether the evidence, if substantiated, raises a legitimate question of liability. Its finding does not decide the ultimate merits of the claim.
Under Massachusetts Superior Court Rule 73, a plaintiff generally must file an offer of proof within 15 days after each defendant’s answer. A party seeking a tribunal generally must demand it within 30 days after the answer, although the rule permits adjustments and alternative procedures.
Following an unfavorable tribunal finding, the plaintiff generally must post a $6,000 aggregate bond within 30 days to proceed. The judge may increase the bond or reduce it upon a finding of indigency, but cannot eliminate the bond on that basis.
Limits on Medical Malpractice Damages
Chapter 231, Section 60H generally limits pain and suffering and certain other noneconomic damages to $500,000 in covered malpractice actions.
The limit may be exceeded where the factfinder finds a substantial or permanent loss or impairment of a bodily function, substantial disfigurement, or other special circumstances warranting an exception. Section 60H does not apply to wrongful death actions under Chapter 229, Section 2.
Economic damages, including medically supported additional treatment expenses and lost earnings, are distinct from the general damages subject to Section 60H.
A separate Chapter 231, Section 85K provision generally limits qualifying malpractice claims against nonprofit healthcare organizations to $100,000, excluding interest and costs, when the negligent conduct occurred in furtherance of their charitable purposes. The limit is not automatic for every hospital or individual provider.
Evidence That Can Support a Medical Malpractice Claim
Medical records can show what providers knew, how symptoms developed, and when tests or treatments were ordered. Our attorneys obtain relevant records and consult specialists where the medical issues require it.
Relevant evidence may include:
- Physician and nursing records: Symptoms, examinations, bedside observations, treatment decisions, and changes in the patient’s condition.
- Laboratory results and original imaging: Findings that can be evaluated independently for missed or delayed diagnoses.
- Operative, anesthesia, and medication records: Procedures, administered drugs, vital-sign monitoring, and postoperative care.
- Patient communications: Portal messages, referrals, discharge instructions, and reports of worsening symptoms.
- Electronic medical record audit data: Available information about when entries were created, viewed, or changed, considered in clinical context.
- Financial and expert records: Additional medical bills, wage documentation, rehabilitation needs, and expert assessments of future care.
Medical expert reviews, depositions, and court fees can make malpractice litigation expensive. Our attorneys assess the necessary evidence and anticipated case expenses before pursuing litigation.
Talk to a lawyer and get a free case evaluation today.
Compensation for Patients Harmed by Medical Malpractice
Patients may recover compensation for additional injuries and financial losses attributable to negligent care when the evidence satisfies Massachusetts law.
Recoverable damages may include:
- Medical expenses: Corrective procedures, additional hospitalization, medication, rehabilitation, and reasonably necessary future treatment.
- Lost wages and earning capacity: Income lost during recovery and future losses caused by lasting disability.
- Long-term assistance: Personal care, mobility equipment, necessary home modifications, and related support.
- Pain and suffering: Physical pain, emotional distress, disfigurement, and limitations on ordinary activities, where recoverable.
- Wrongful death damages: In wrongful death cases, we help families pursue compensation through claims brought by the deceased person’s executor or administrator for eligible beneficiaries’ lost financial support, services, care, companionship, and reasonable funeral expenses under Chapter 229, Section 2.
Recoverable damages depend on the proven losses, medical causation, and applicable statutory limitations.
What to Do if You Suspect a Medical Error
Prompt treatment of new or worsening symptoms should take priority. An independent medical evaluation may identify additional care needs.
Consider these steps:
- Seek appropriate treatment: Obtain prompt assessment of worsening symptoms or complications that may require urgent attention.
- Request another medical opinion: Ask another qualified provider to assess the current condition and any necessary testing or treatment.
- Collect medical records: Request clinical notes, laboratory results, imaging, medication records, operative reports, and discharge documents.
- Record a treatment timeline: Note appointments, symptoms, provider communications, and when you learned of a possible error.
- Preserve evidence of losses: Keep medical bills, work restrictions, correspondence, and documentation of additional care needs.
- Speak with a Massachusetts medical malpractice lawyer: Our attorneys can investigate the suspected error, identify potentially liable parties, and evaluate presuit notice and filing deadlines.
Contact Our Quincy Medical Malpractice Attorneys
Medical negligence can cause additional treatment costs, lasting disability, or death. Claims may require substantial medical evidence to establish what should have happened and how the care caused harm.
Marasco & Nesselbush investigates medical negligence claims, obtains medical expert opinions when necessary, and represents clients through settlement negotiations or litigation. We serve Norfolk County and the South Shore from our Quincy office.
Contact Marasco & Nesselbush for a free consultation about suspected medical negligence and your legal options.**
We handle qualifying medical malpractice cases on a contingent fee basis, subject to Massachusetts law and the written representation agreement.
