Overworked nurses, unprepared surgeons, careless physicians, and short-staffed hospitals can all contribute to potential patient harm across any area of medicine. The most common medical malpractice cases Clifford Law Offices reviews are related to failure to diagnose and treat common medical conditions such as heart attack, infection and pulmonary embolism, preventable birth injury and birth trauma, surgical errors and lack of informed consent, and delayed or misdiagnosis cases.

If you suspect you or a loved one has been a victim of medical malpractice, knowing whether or not you have a case and identifying the best course of action can feel overwhelming. Taking the proper steps to prepare and protect yourself leading up to a claim can impact the overall success of your case. Continue reading to learn what steps you can take if you suspect medical malpractice.

Seek Medical Attention

If you are suffering from complications associated with suspected medical malpractice, it is imperative that you seek medical attention immediately to ensure you are not exposed to greater risk by prolonging proper medical treatment. Obtaining a second medical opinion often helps prevent further severe complications and can illuminate the cause or source of your initial injury.

Collect and Preserve Documentation

As soon as you suspect that you or a loved one may have been a victim of malpractice, request all medical records and healthcare documents from your healthcare providers. These records detail symptoms, medical history, diagnostic records, and prescribed medications, among other medical treatments. Practitioners are required to keep medical documentation which is vital in determining if you have a case and how your attorney should proceed. Remember to include a request for any imaging (X-rays, CT scans, MRIs, etc.), monitoring (EKGs, Fetal Monitor Strips), and pathology results.

In the event of a family member’s death, it is possible to request an autopsy to gain further understanding and documentation of what specific action or inaction caused death. If an autopsy was not offered by the institution where the death occurred or the medical examiner’s office, private autopsy options are available.

Research Illinois Medical Malpractice Claims

While every medical malpractice claim contains its own unique set of circumstances, understanding important aspects of the law such as the Illinois medical malpractice statute of limitations can help you ensure a viable case. Likewise, researching the results of previous cases brought against the same provider can provide you with additional perspective.

Taking time to research firms that specialize in medical malpractice is also essential to your claim. It is important to connect with a firm that has the resources and expertise to handle the most challenging cases and deliver results.

Contact An Attorney

Not every medical injury is caused by malpractice. It can be difficult to know if negligence occurred and how to prove it. An experienced medical malpractice attorney can help you understand the circumstances of your case, initiate private investigations, and determine options that are available for you to pursue.

Medical malpractice cases are notoriously complex and acting quickly to initiate a claim is key. If you believe you have been the victim of medical malpractice, do not hesitate to contact Clifford Law Offices, Chicago’s premiere medical malpractice law firm. Our attorneys have significant experience handling medical malpractice claims and have recovered hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of injured patients.

The post What Should I Do If I Suspect Medical Malpractice? appeared first on Clifford Law Offices.

Finding an experienced truck accident attorney is an important step in dealing with the aftermath of a truck accident. Even before that, though, it can be immensely helpful to understand how collisions with these large commercial vehicles differ from those that just involve another passenger vehicle.

Here are some basics to know, preferably before you even get behind the wheel:

1. Commercial vehicles are larger and operate differently.

Because of their sheer size, large commercial trucks are inherently bound to cause more damage in an accident. Regular passenger cars weigh about 5,000 pounds. By comparison, the maximum weight (without oversize or overweight permits) for a semi truck is 80,000 pounds. Add onto that the sheer size of a semi, about 70–80 feet long, and the difference between the two vehicles is apparent.

Trucks and cars also operate differently, which can be a factor in determining liability in an accident. For example, trucks take much longer to stop than a regular passenger vehicle. They also make wider turns, require more gears to operate, and can be much more difficult to control during bad weather conditions.

2. Different laws apply to trucks.

Passenger vehicles typically only have to follow state and local traffic laws. Truck drivers, on the other hand, must also adhere to federal laws. For example, they must follow Hours of Service regulations, which stipulate how long they are allowed to drive, when they must take breaks, and, importantly, how they keep track of their time.

Nowadays, electronic logging devices, called ELDs, automatically record a trucker’s driving hours, replacing the old pen and paper logs. While this has caused some controversy in the trucker community, the devices provide more precise information about how long a truck has been on the road. As the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) notes, ELDs make log information “available for roadside inspection by enforcement officers, as well as transmits the data to the carrier.”

In the event of an accident, you should be aware of this feature, as it could be used as evidence if the crash occurred because a driver was on the road too long and suffering from exhaustion or sleep deprivation.

Commercial trucks are also regulated by the FMCSA and the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT). Trucking companies and drivers must follow a strict set of rules from these departments around vehicle maintenance, maximum load weight, securing loads, and other factors.

3. Truck accidents could involve several negligent parties.

Car crashes normally involve just one or two people. With a commercial truck accident, many more parties can be involved — not only the truck driver but also the parent trucking company, loading companies, service providers, and companies that manufacture parts of the truck. Any one of these parties could be at fault in the event of an accident.

For example, in a cargo-related accident, where the items on the truck spill onto the road and damage other vehicles and people, the loading company as well as the driver might be at fault. If the truck driver was not being negligent and the accident occured because of improper loading, more of the liability lands on the loading company.

A thorough investigation of the accident will ideally surface those types of facts, along with manufacturing defects, violations of the Hours of Service regulations, and other factors leading to the crash.

4. Truck insurance companies are not your friend.

Trucking companies generally have large insurance companies and armies of lawyers ready to fight as hard as possible to avoid paying your claim. These companies rarely have your best interests at heart — more often, they want to protect their own financial interests. Do not expect them to be on your side, even when the fault lies with the other driver, the trucking company, or the equipment manufacturer.

They may try — with urgency — to offer you a payout. While it’s important to act quickly after any accident, never accept a settlement or sign anything from a truck insurance company before first discussing it with your attorney. Avoid giving any recorded statements unless it is under the advice of your own attorney.

Having this knowledge may not make your process for filing a claim any less complex, but can save you some emotional and psychological stress in the aftermath of an accident with a large commercial vehicle.

Clifford Law Offices has extensive experience representing victims of large commercial truck accidents. If you or someone you love has been injured, please reach out to us today.

The post Trucks vs. Cars: Why Not All Vehicle Crashes Are the Same appeared first on Clifford Law Offices.

The Illinois Department of Revenue issued these guidelines that indicate “These extensions do not grant you an extension of time to pay any tax you owe.”

Click here to view some insights on what to do about estimated tax payments due April 15 and June 15 in Illinois.

The federal government has extended the filing deadline to July 15, 2020, the April 15 filing of federal taxes to the IRS. If you do file, only electronic returns are being processed now because offices are closed. That’s also the fastest way to get money back if you are entitled to a refund.

Here is a helpful article from Business Insider magazine that answers many questions for those who aren’t sure what to do: https://bit.ly/2Vc0W8i

Tax experts need to be consulted. It’s necessary to read the new rules carefully and make sure that you are in compliance with all of the changes. Check with your tax consultant.

The post Tax Day Extended – Some Still May Owe Today appeared first on Clifford Law Offices.