More details to this question:
I had a crown placed 3 yrs ago with root canal. I had not had any pain or issues. At my most recent cleaning, the hygienist was cleaning my teeth and really pulling the tool on the crown. Her tool slipped and she said, oh what is going here, the crown is loose. I told her it really hurt and she said, yes there is some irritation. Then took at xray of the tooth. Come to find out the root was fractured and within a a few weeks, the crown fell out. I had zero problems prior to the visit. Is it possible the hygienist broke the root, causing the post to come out? How can I prove this? My dental insurance will only pay a portion of the extraction of the broken tooth and my medical insurance will not pay for any.
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You may have a case but I can tell you that professional medical/dental malpractice cases are exceedingly difficult to pursue and win in Wisconsin. I wrote a blog about it at our web site, and the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel did an excellent article about it last year that detailed the problems. While there may arguably have been malpractice, you also need to prove damages. It is not enough that an error or mistake was arguably made and that is wherein lies the difficulty of pursuing your case. Unless there are significant damages, you probably are going to find difficulty in finding any malpractice/injury lawyer who may be interested in taking the case. It is also possible that the crown got loose on its' own and had nothing to do with what the hygenist was doing, and that is probably going to be their defense. The statute of limitations for suing on dental malpractice in Wisconsin is three years. If you fail to file a lawsuit within three years from the date of hte occurrence, your claim would be forever barred.
Answered on Jul 19th, 2016 at 6:53 AM
David B. Karp Karp & Iancu, S.C. 933 North Mayfair Road #300 Milwaukee, WI 53226 414 453 0800 dbk@karplawfirm.com www.karplawfirm.com