In Washington by statute medical malpractice claims must be brought under one of three theories.

1. Failure to follow the accepted standard of care
2. Breach of warranty
3. Failure to Provide informed consent[1]

The standard of care has two elements:

(1) The health care provider failed to exercise that degree of care, skill, and learning expected of a reasonably prudent health care provider at that time in the profession or class to which he belongs, in the state of Washington, acting in the same or similar circumstances;

(2) Such failure was a proximate cause of the injury complained of.[2]

A doctor will not normally be held liable for a bad result in and of itself absent a contract promising the patient a particular result.[3] It must, rather, be shown that the doctor’s conduct fell below a level that society considers acceptable. [4] Even under the negligence doctrine of res ipsa loquitur, there must be evidence from which negligence can at least be inferred.[5]

A physician faced with competing therapeutic techniques or diagnoses is entitled to male an error in judgment if, in arriving at that judgment, the physician exercised reasonable care and skill, within the standard of care the physician was obliged to follow.[6]

[2] RCW 7.70.040.

[3] Watson v. Hackett, 107 Wn.2d 158 (1986).

[4] Id., citing Harris v. Groth, 99 Wn.2d 438, 445, 663 P.2d 113 (1983).

[5] Id., citing Stone v. Sisters of Charity, 2 Wn. App. 607, 612, 469 P.2d 229 (1970).

[6] Christensen v. Munsen, 123 Wn.2d 234, 249, 867 P.2d 626, 30 A.L.R.5th 822 (1994).