Use of trauma scoring systems to determine the physician's responsibility in cases of traumatic death with medical malpractice claim.

BACKGROUND: Traumatic injury is near the top of World Health Organization list of leading causes of death, and one of the major factors affecting mortality is the severity of the trauma. During medical intervention for trauma patients, some injuries may be overlooked, and this misstep may be the basis of a malpractice claim. The objective of this study was to provide a new approach to evaluating medical malpractice cases by discussing the benefits of the use of trauma scores.

METHODS: Cases of alleged malpractice that were discussed and concluded between 2010 and 2013 were selected from the case archive of the General Committee of the Council of Forensic Medicine (GC of CFM). Injury severity scores were calculated from the medical records of accused physicians and from the autopsy or final clinical evaluation records and compared.

RESULTS: Between the years 2010 and 2013, 263 cases of alleged medical malpractice were discussed and concluded by the general committee. Of these, in 25 cases of patient death, the reason for admission to the hospital was traumatic injury. Various surgical specialties were involved. In these 25 cases, 34 physicians were accused of medical malpractice, and the General Committee classified the interventions of 14 physicians in 12 cases as "malpractice." Missed injuries and unrecognized diagnoses can be established by comparing the Injury Severity Score and New Injury Severity Score values in the findings of accused physicians with the subsequent findings of last evaluation or autopsy.

CONCLUSION: In a medical malpractice case, calculating injury severity scores may assist an expert witness or judge to detect any unseen injuries and to determine the likely survival potential of the patient, but these values do not provide enough information to evaluate all of the evidence or draw conclusions about the entire case. All contributing factors to trauma severity should be considered along with the trauma score and other case factors.