Prevalence and content of legal suits founded on dental malpractice in the courts of midwest Brazil (original) (raw)
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SURVEY AND ANALYSIS OF THE JURISPRUDENCE OF THE COURT OF JUSTICE OF THE STATE OF PARANÁ CONCERNING THE CIVIL LIABILITY OF DENTAL SURGEONS (Atena Editora), 2023
There has been an increase in the number of lawsuits filed against dental surgeons (DCs) in Brazil over the last few years. This study aims to understand and analyze the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the State of Paraná (TJPR) regarding the civil liability of dental surgeons, as well as present the profile and understanding of the factors involved in these legal proceedings. This is a documentary research, carried out by consulting the TJPR website, selecting the consultation option, the jurisprudence option, then selecting the jurisprudence research field. After completing these initial steps, the following keywords will be used for consultation in the free search field: “Dental surgeon”, “Dental clinic”, “Dentist”, “Dental”, “Dental error”, “Dentistry”, “Dentologist” and “Odontologist”. To filter the legal proceedings that occurred between January 2000 and December 2020, the keywords initially used were refined with another keyword: civil liability of the Dental professional. For analysis of jurisprudence, the cases were reclassified as follows: year of judgment; area of activity or specialty of the professional; average compensation value. Excel® spreadsheets were created to record data from the evaluated processes, so that the analysis of the same process would not be counted when the keywords or any other study variable were crossed. After collecting the research data, graphs and tables were created to compare and analyze the final results. In view of this, we obtained data relating to the quantitative and qualitative profile of lawsuits against dentistry professionals, as well as guidance for dental surgeons on the importance of knowing the characteristics of the legal demand and its implications for their contemporary professional activity.
Civil liability: characterization of the demand for lawsuits against dentists
Brazilian Oral Research, 2016
In light of the fact that dentists may be held civilly liable for their practice, it is important to understand the current situation of lawsuits filed against these professionals by studying current legal decisions and the literature. The objective of this study was to analyze the case law of the Court of Justice of São Paulo, Brazil, relative to the profile of patients and professionals, the most commonly involved specialties, the amounts litigated and the court decisions pertaining to civil liability lawsuits against dentists. In an inductive approach, a single researcher screened and collected civil liability rulings by accessing the Court's website, and following a statistical-descriptive procedure and an indirect observation technique. The most frequently involved specialty was prosthodontics. However, oral and maxillofacial surgery was related to a higher incidence of damages awarded to settle claims and to higher damage amounts. The dentist was found guilty in 44.32% of the cases researched.
Dental Press Journal of Orthodontics, 2018
Objective: the present study aimed at evaluating the risks and vulnerability of orthodontists to legal compensation actions and verifying the hypothesis of these health care professionals having little knowledge concerning their rights and obligations as service providers. Methods: Three groups were formed to participate in a semi-structured interview. The first group had thirteen law professionals, the second group was composed of eleven orthodontists and the third group was made up of nine randomly selected orthodontic patients. Results: Relevant aspects related to the exercise of the professional activity of orthodontists that influence on the vulnerability of orthodontists in lawsuits were identified. After transcription, reading, and comparing the answers of the interviews, items capable of influencing judicial decisions, from the standpoint of Brazilian Justice Courts, were evaluated. Conclusion: It was verified that Brazilian orthodontists do not have adequate formation conce...
2020
Patient safety and quality of healthcare delivery systems are an objective of WHO. This study aims to present and analyse Portuguese clinical data on risk and malpractice in dental practice. Data from the Forensic Dentistry Laboratory (Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra) was analysed, between the years of 2013 to 2018. One hundred and seven technical reports were selected, and seventy nine files were included in the iatrogenic sequelae group. Data included the analysis of the performance of dental professionals. Sequelae were divided in descending order of occurrence:1) mandibular dysfunction (53,2%)[(42)79]; 2) neurological deficit (39,2%)[(31)79]; 3) tooth loss (6,3%)[(5)79]; and 4) opening deficit (1,3%)[(1)79].Three major areas with significant expression in the field of expert evaluations were analysed: 1) orthodontic treatment (51,9%), implant rehabilitation (29,1%), and oral surgery. Given the prevalence of malpractice, the need to assess its causes and recognise stan...
Evaluation of injury cases for dental intervention described in legal dentistry reports. Int. J. Odontostomat., 9(3):533-539, 2015. ABSTRACT: The dentist responsibility on dental interventions during the exercise of his/her activity guides in civil, ethical, administrative and criminal obligations. When a harmful result occurs on a patient whether by recklessness, malpractice and / or negligence, the examination of the injury can be ordered by a judicial authority and held at the expert level, thus making the dentist subject to the Brazilian Penal Code and its penalties. The dentist might be forced to repair the damage and compensate according to the caused consequence, based on the Civil Code, or both and may suffer a double action. With the increase of Dentistry-related processes, the focus of this research is to give greater visibility to the subject, emphasizing the ethical and legal aspects involved in professional practice. To meet this end, we carried out a survey on reports of maxillofacial injuries from the "Instituto Médico Legal Nina Rodrigues", Salvador-BA-Brazil, from January 2007 to December 2013, analyzing the data on the procedures performed, the reason for the expert's report and its result, the professional responsibility and the conclusion given by the expert. It was noticed that from the total of personal injury examinations made by dentists, most of the complaints are in the area of surgery (42.9%), followed by Endodontics and Orthodontics with 14.3% each, and in 96 % of cases involved one or more elements of professional liability and 47.4% were classified by experts as minor injuries. It is concluded that the increase in injuries lawsuits generated in service is due to the fact that the dentist does not take responsibility to protect himself/herself from poor results and to perform procedures without having the proper skill. It is therefore suggested, professional training for the acquisition of technical and scientific knowledge in their area, enabling them to act with utmost in care and professionalism.
Revista da Faculdade de Odontologia de Porto Alegre, 2012
It is important to comply with the administrative and regulatory requirements in hiring and provision of position for Dentists that underwent public admission examinations to operate on public health service. The activity provided by dental general practitioner or member of a Family Health Team-FHT is characterized by continuous and indispensable health services to the population. Therefore, it is recommended that these positions, whenever possible, be filled by public admission examinations. This paper aims to report a case of investigation by the Public Ministry with forensic dental counseling, in which aspects of provision of position and operation of Dentists of the FHT and general practitioners in the Brazilian public health system were compared, addressing the ethical and legal aspects inherent to the subject. In the case studied it was found that the functions performed by Dentists who work in the FHT and Basic Health Units are similar to each other, and that no technical req...
Risk and limits in dental practice: a Portuguese approach to medical responsibility
The Journal of forensic odonto-stomatology, 2020
Orofacial impairment analysis is based on the gathering of information to prove the causal link between the event and the individual’s clinical condition. It also intends to evaluate corporal damage according to the medical law context(criminal, civil or labor). The aim of this article is to answer the questions: What are the assumptions of malpractice? How far should we risk? Can we anticipate it? Data from the Forensic Dentistry Laboratory (Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra) was analyzed, between the years of 2013 to 2018. The analysis of leges artis limits was performed, according to the type of clinical procedure.107 files were selected.Our data support that there are three major areas with significant expression in the field of expert evaluations: implants, orthodontics and oral surgery.We believe that long and complex treatments could explain the prevalence of leges artis limits situations. We consider the necessary monitoring procedures to prevent unlawful acts
We have studied 142 claims against dental surgeons, related to prosthodontics and periodontal treatment, in order to understand its motivation. These claims were submitted to the Commission of Claim Examination and Conciliation of the Regional Dental Council of São Paulo -CROSP, from 1993 to 1997. We have observed that 88% of these claims were related to treatments done in private dental offices and that 84.5% of them involved relationship difficulties between the patient and the dentist. We have also studied the documentation provided by patients in their claims and by professionals in their defense. We believe that these informations may be helpful to guide dental surgeons in the prevention of new claims, as well in the production of appropriated clinical documentation.
2013
In the good old days doctors were viewed upon as demi-gods. Whatever was given, prescribed, ordered or done by the doctor was accepted without any doubt or suspicion. If any complication or undesirable side effect resulted, it was accepted by all concerned. Now the circumstances have changed altogether. People have become conscious of their rights including right to know the nature of illness and details of the treatment. Because of sustained campaign in media and also due to malpractice by some doctors, faith is being replaced by suspicion. Doctor-patient relationship is no longer healthy. There is an increasing trend of medical litigation by unsatisfied patients. The Supreme Court has laid down guidelines for the criminal prosecution of a doctor. This has decreased the unnecessary harassment of the doctors. A doctor owes a certain duties towards his patient and a breach of any of these duties gives a cause of action of negligence against the doctor. It is important to know what constitutes medical negligence. In the era of globalization, information is now universally accessible to health care practitioners and to the general public. Global communication with colleagues is instantly available through a click of the mouse. This universal accessibility to information has raised a number of legal concerns. Attention to detail, good communication and excellent documentation can help reduce a teledentistry practitioner's medium-associated liability. This paper reviews thereasons as to why a dentist should be aware of his/her rights, duties and how the medico-legal claims can be avoided.