My question involves medical malpractice in the state of: NY
I went to the dentist to have a crown re-cemented because it was loose and they broke the tooth while removing it. What I mean is they broke the tooth the crown was screwed on to, now I have to get a very expensive implant. Ofcourse the dentist said it was already broken before and put the crown back on, but I know it was not like that because now I can't even bite down on it now.
Obviously I have no way to prove it wasn't like that before. So is there a legitimate case here?
First, contrary to some claims otherwise, when you file a malpractice suit against a professional person (be it doctor, lawyer, dentist), you are essentially challenging their professional reputation. The costs involved in doing so can be extremely high, because professional reputations are extremely valuable.
Any malpractice suit you consider will generally not be a "head to small claims" legal action. The dentist will not simply hand over to you a fistful of dollars because you think he broke your tooth. The dentist will be represented by an experienced malpractice attorney provided by his malpractice insurer. There will be dental experts provided by the insurer, ready to examine the facts. And, while the insurance provider will try to minimize the costs for his client, there will not be a settlement if your claims have no merit.
If you have any hope at all of recovering costs of your dental implant, you will need a malpractice attorney and dental experts of your own, to offset the findings of defense experts. An expert hired by you to examine the dental records and the facts stands to cost you almost as much as what you are hoping to recover in the way of damages.
By the time your case has reached the discovery stage and expert examinations and attorney fees and court costs are figured, the amounts spent can easily be in the $30,000 to $50,000 range. If the experts agree that there was an acceptable standard of care by the dentist and no negligence, the suit will likely be dismissed.
You can certainly run the facts of your dental experience by an attorney in your area, fstep, but I fear that $5000 in damages will not be enough to lure an attorney to your case and, without solid evidence that the tooth was not already damaged prior to the removal of the crown (and it seems likely the crown was loose
due to underlying tooth damage), there is unlikely to be a settlement.
But good luck with it all.