Page 39 - Anatomy of a Medical Malpractice Lawsuit

SVMIC Anatomy of a Medical Malpractice Lawsuit

It is important to keep in mind that the interrogatories (and the

other discovery discussed herein) are continuing, which means
that if a response changes or additional information becomes

available, the answers must be supplemented. Also, while the

rules can limit the number of questions that can be asked in
one set of interrogatories, multiple sets of interrogatories can

be served. In a malpractice lawsuit, it is not uncommon for
there to be several rounds of interrogatories exchanged

between the parties.

The main takeaway for the physician is to promptly and

completely gather the information necessary to respond to the
interrogatories and to allow adequate time to work with his or

her defense attorney to get them answered. Because this is
written discovery, usually this can be accomplished via mail or

electronically, and it is not necessary for a separate face-to-
face meeting.

Requests for Production

Requests to produce, as the name implies, is a demand that

another party makes specified records and other documents

available for examination and copying. The definition of
documents for discovery purposes is very broad and includes

not only paper records, but also information stored via

electronic media such as: texts, emails, photographs,
audio/video recordings, cell phone records/data, social media

posts, EHR metadata, as well as information on flash drives,
disks, and cloud storage. Virtually any information that has

been reduced to tangible or electronic form can be requested.

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