Medical Malpractice

Since its founding in 1997, Pierce & Thornton has focused its law practice on representing the rights of patients and their families who have been the victims of medical negligence. We have won medical malpractice cases at trial and successfully settled them prior to trial. We have handled medical malpractice cases involving virtually all areas of medical care – – emergency room negligence, birth injuries caused by negligence pre-natal care or delivery, surgical negligence, prescription errors, nursing home neglect and sub-standard nursing care in the hospital.. Our case summaries reflect the type of clients and their families whom we have been fortunate to represent, oftentimes in the most dire circumstances.

At Pierce & Thornton, we are committed to providing you and your family personal service when you have been harmed by inadequate medical care. When we take on your case, we are committed to investigating all of the surrounding facts of your care, reviewing carefully the medical records and researching the relevant medical issues, if necessary, to make sure we have a full grasp of all of the medical and legal issues in your case. If our research and experience indicate that you may have a case, then we will have the case reviewed by qualified medical experts who will confirm whether your case has merit.

It has been our experience that medical negligence cases rarely settle at the outset because doctors and their insurance companies are willing and able to mount a defense by hiring their own experts to defend the care rendered. The frequent argument from the doctor and the insurance company is that the “doctor used his or her best judgment” or that the result was an “associated risk” of the procedure. The key to winning a medical negligence case is having an experienced attorney who can analyze all of the medical and legal issues in your case and prepare your case effectively for trial.

By now, most have read or heard about the study by the Institute of Medicine that concluded “medical errors may cause up to 98,000 preventable deaths in U.S. hospitals each year”. As shocking as that number is, national data also indicates that the doctor or hospital still win medical malpractice trials approximately 70% of the time. The question is why do the doctors and hospitals win more often than the patients? Some of it certainly stems from cases being filed and proceeding to trial that should have never been filed in the first place. Some of the losses are probably linked to the lawyer not presenting the patient’s case as effectively as the lawyers for the doctor or hospital. Finally, there is an inherent bias in favor of doctors and hospitals, particularly when the doctor or hospital is local, as is almost always the case. In other words, members of a jury in a close case will likely give the benefit of the doubt to the doctor or hospital versus the patient.

At Pierce & Thornton, we are aware of these challenges facing anyone who takes on a hospital or doctor and their insurance company. We have successfully settled, mediated and taken to trial numerous medical malpractice cases. Some of the cases were claims that had been turned down or rejected by other law firms here in Norfolk, Virginia Beach, Chesapeake and Portsmouth. We have also successfully handled medical malpractice cases in North Carolina. Our goal at Pierce & Thornton is simple: we work hard to investigate, prepare and win your case.

At Pierce & Thornton, we are fortunate to have represented many deserving clients and their families in their claims against negligent doctors, nurses and hospitals, and have obtained results for our clients that have helped them piece their lives back together after a tragic injury or loss of a loved one. There are many questions that must be answered when something unexpected or tragic happens while under a doctor’s or hospital’s care. Let Pierce & Thornton help you and your family answer the questions concerning medical malpractice, and if medical negligence has been committed, we will pursue it for you and protect you and your family’s interests.

If you feel that you or a loved one is the victim of medical malpractice, we urge you to contact the attorneys at Pierce & Thornton so that our firm can begin investigating and preparing your case for settlement or if necessary, trial.