Photo Credit: Lusia83

The standard of care definition can vary during medical malpractice cases, and physicians must prove they acted in accordance with good, accepted practice.

The term “standard of care” may give the impression that it is a rigid goal. However, doctors practice in various locations, and medicine itself is changing under our feet. How can all this be pinned down in a malpractice case to declare that a doctor was negligent?

Legally, the standard of care is recognized as acceptable and appropriate by reasonably prudent, similar physicians. It’s usually referred to as “good and accepted medical practice.” As an explanatory term, it means doing what is reasonable under the actual circumstances.

Both sides can introduce expert testimony on the level of care that should have been met in the case. To win, the plaintiff must show negligent treatment, meaning it fell below the standard of care. The defense will be that the doctor acted as they reasonably should have under those conditions.

How Is a Doctor Judged?

A defendant doctor should only be judged by the practices within their specialty. An expert witness will explain to the jury what is accepted as the standard of care in that area of medicine. Many states have required that the expert be in the same specialty or subspecialty as the defendant doctor.

If the doctor does their best under limited circumstances, that is their defense. But how about when the doctor deliberately acts inconsistently with the applicable standard because they believe an alternative is clinically correct?

The answer is that the standard of care is not a popularity contest. Courts recognize what’s called “the respectable minority rule.” This allows the defendant doctor to show, through an expert, the literature, and their own experience, that the course of care they followed is one that a non-insignificant proportion of practitioners use. It’s not something they pulled out of their hat, and there’s proven clinical grounding for it that reasonable doctors follow, even though another approach is dominant in the field.

Standard of Care Accommodations

This means the standard of care can accommodate changing methodology. But “reasonability under the circumstances” is still the watchword.

Courts acknowledge that although medicine must have formalized standards for practice, gray areas exist. The defense expert’s job is to bring the doctor’s thinking and medical judgment within the standard of care beyond static limits.

Fairness is the defining requirement for the standard of care. It’s a bridge between objective requirements and practical reality.