What to do if I had rods inserted in my spine to straighten it out but about 1 1/2 years ago the rods started to move and now the pain is making my life impossible?
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What to do if I had rods inserted in my spine to straighten it out but about 1 1/2 years ago the rods started to move and now the pain is making my life impossible?
I am an accountant and can’t sit to do my work; I am on lots of pain medication and do not have much expectation of things improving. Is there any legal recourse for this situation? My surgery was almost 10 years ago.
Asked on February 12, 2014 under Malpractice Law, Florida
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 10 years ago | Contributor
It is most likely too late to bring your claim, though to confirm this, speak *immediately* with a local malpractice attorney. In FL, as a general matter, a patient injured by malpractice has only two years to bring a legal action (the "statute of limitations"). There is a limited exceptiton is the malpractice would not have been immediately detectable by or known to a reasonable person: in that case, the patient would get 2 years from the date of actual or presumptive (when a reasonable person would have known) discovery.
However, there is also a four year "statute of repose," which states that unless there was fraud, deliberate concealment, or the like by the doctor (that is, he took affirmative steps to hide malpractice), no claim can be brought more than 4 years after the medical care--and you write that the surgery was almost 10 years ago. Therefore the time limit in the statute of repose would seem to preclude bringing a lawsuit.
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