Boston Medical Malpractice Lawyers

75+ Years of Combined Experience for Patients Harmed by Medical Negligence

Medical errors cause serious, lasting harm. When a doctor, surgeon, or hospital falls below the accepted standard of care, patients and families are left to bear consequences they never should have faced. Our Boston medical malpractice attorneys at Crowe & Harris, LLP have been fighting for those patients since 1999, recovering millions of dollars for clients throughout New England.

Our founding partner, Philip J. Crowe, has been licensed since 1969 and is a member of both the American Association for Justice and the Massachusetts Academy of Trial Attorneys. Senior partners are directly involved in every case, working alongside attorneys, full-time nurses, paralegals, and support staff to evaluate claims and build a strategy around each client’s specific situation.

Contact our Boston medical malpractice team: Contact us online or call (617) 404-3417 for a free consultation today.

On This Page:

• What Is Medical Malpractice?
• Medical Malpractice Claims We Handle
• What Are the Four Elements of Medical Malpractice?
• What Is Informed Consent?
• What If I Didn’t Immediately Know Malpractice Occurred?
• Why Do I Need an Attorney?

What Is Medical Malpractice?

Medical malpractice is professional negligence by a healthcare provider in which the treatment delivered falls below the accepted standard of care in that medical field and causes injury or death to the patient. It applies whether the failure was an action taken or a step not taken.

The scale of the problem is significant. According to the National Practitioner Data Bank, Massachusetts saw 242 medical malpractice payments in a single year, with over 85% of those payments exceeding $50,000 and a total of more than $149 million awarded to victims statewide. Nationally, more than 11,000 payments were made that year, totaling over $3.65 billion. Many victims never come forward, assuming their situation doesn’t qualify.

If you or someone you love was harmed by a healthcare provider, you may be entitled to compensation for medical bills, lost wages, and pain and suffering.

Medical Malpractice Claims We Handle

Every medical malpractice case involves a distinct set of facts, injuries, and liable parties. We provide individualized attention to each claim, drawing on our team’s combined legal and medical knowledge to pursue just compensation.

The types of cases we handle include:

• Birth Injuries: Negligence during delivery can cause brain damage, nerve injuries, and other lasting harm to newborns.
• Cancer Misdiagnosis: A missed or delayed cancer diagnosis closes the window for timely treatment and can turn a manageable condition into a fatal one.
• Wrongful Death: When medical negligence takes a loved one’s life, surviving family members may pursue compensation for their loss.
• Wrong or Late Diagnosis: An incorrect or delayed diagnosis can allow a treatable condition to progress beyond the point of effective intervention.
• Hospital Negligence: Hospitals bear responsibility for coordinated care. When staff failures or systemic breakdowns injure a patient, the institution can be held liable.
• Anesthesia Negligence: Errors in anesthesia administration can result in brain injury, blindness, or death.
• Surgical Errors: Surgeons who operate carelessly or without appropriate skill are responsible for the harm that follows.
• Stroke and TIA: A TIA, or transient ischemic attack, is a brief episode of neurological dysfunction caused by a temporary disruption of blood flow to the brain. A TIA significantly raises the risk of a subsequent stroke, and physicians who miss these warning signs can cause serious harm.
• Robotic Surgery: Robotic surgical tools require specific training. Surgeons who use them without adequate preparation put patients at unnecessary risk.
• Radiology: Misread or overlooked imaging results, including MRIs and CT scans, can cause conditions to worsen when early intervention was possible.
• Cardiac Surgery: Errors during heart surgery, even minor ones, can cause brain damage or death in both adult and pediatric patients.
• Emergency Room Errors: High-pressure ER environments increase the risk of rushed decisions, missed symptoms, and improper treatment.
• Medication Errors: The wrong drug or an incorrect dosage can have permanent consequences. Both prescribing physicians and pharmacists can be held accountable.

Contact our medical malpractice lawyers in MA today at (617) 404-3417 to discuss your case.

What Are the Four Elements of Medical Malpractice?

To bring a viable medical malpractice claim, four elements must be present. These are sometimes called the four Ds, and understanding them helps clarify whether a situation may support a claim.

• Duty: A doctor-patient relationship establishes a legal duty of care. Once that relationship exists, the provider is obligated to treat the patient with reasonable skill and care.
• Deviation: The provider must have deviated from the accepted standard of care. This means showing that a competent provider in the same field wouldn’t have made the same decision or error.
• Damages: A mistake alone doesn’t create a claim. The deviation must have caused actual physical or emotional harm to the patient.
• Direct causation: The damages must be directly linked to the provider’s conduct. This causal connection can be difficult to establish without medical knowledge and legal experience working together.

What Is Informed Consent?

Informed consent is a legal and ethical requirement that physicians obtain a patient’s knowing agreement before proceeding with any treatment or procedure. It isn’t simply a signature on a form. For consent to be valid, the patient must understand what is being proposed and what that decision means for their care.

Information that may be required for valid informed consent includes:

• Doctor’s qualifications
• Details of the patient’s condition
• Details of the proposed treatment plan
• Alternative treatment options
• Potential side effects of treatment
• Treatment prognosis

When a provider proceeds without properly obtaining informed consent, and the patient is harmed, the provider can be held liable for medical malpractice. Our attorneys can review whether consent was properly obtained in your case and how that may affect your claim.

What If I Didn’t Immediately Know Malpractice Occurred?

Massachusetts imposes a three-year statute of limitations for medical malpractice claims, measured from the point when the injured party learned, or reasonably should have learned, that harm occurred. There is also an absolute bar of seven years from the date of the negligent act. The sole statutory exception to this seven-year bar applies to cases involving a foreign object left inside the body after surgery. Separate tolling rules apply to young children: claims involving children harmed before age six must generally be filed by the child’s ninth birthday.

Why Work With a Boston Medical Malpractice Attorney?

Medical malpractice is one of the most complex areas of litigation. It requires coordination between legal strategy and medical analysis, and it typically involves institutional defendants with significant resources. Having experienced legal representation on your side matters at every stage.

Our attorneys can assist with:

• Proving negligence: Demonstrating that a provider failed to meet the standard of care requires testimony, records, and a clear legal argument. We use your medical history and outside evidence to build that case.
• Expert testimony: Most malpractice claims require qualified medical professionals to speak to the standard of care and how it was breached. We identify and work with those professionals throughout the case.
• Settlement negotiations: Many cases resolve before trial. An experienced attorney is essential for negotiating with hospital defense teams and insurance companies to pursue fair compensation.
• Trial representation: When a case needs to go to a jury, we advocate for you in and out of the courtroom. Michael J. Harris, licensed in Massachusetts and New Hampshire since 2001, has the trial experience these cases demand.

Our team also includes full-time nurses who review medical records and help attorneys understand the clinical facts behind each claim. That internal medical knowledge shapes our case strategy from the first evaluation through resolution.

We hold regular team strategy meetings to refine our approach as each case develops. Senior partners don’t step away after the intake call. They stay involved, and that continuity makes a difference in how cases are prepared and presented.