Good Samaritan Hospital

Good Samaritan Hospital is located in Baltimore, Maryland. It is owned and operated by MedStar, which also runs Franklin Square Hospital, Harbor Hospital, Union Memorial Hospital, St. Mary’s Hospital and Montgomery Medical Center. MedStar is a nonprofit (if you can be a real nonprofit with an executive making $6.5 million in a year).

Good Samaritan offers traditional hospital services such as emergency medicine, cancer care, burn reconstruction, urology, internal medicine, and primary care. Like many Baltimore hospitals, Good Sam has achieved some renown in rehabilitation and orthopedics. The hospital has also made a name for itself in providing care to patients 65 and older.

A relative newcomer to the Maryland medical community, Good Samaritan was founded in 1968. It has expanded to offer nursing care and rehabilitative services to senior citizens, including rent-subsidized apartments. Good Samaritan has 214 licensed beds and operates as a teaching hospital. According to its most recent publicly available tax filing, it has total assets of approximately $207 million and annual revenue of approximately $299 million.

Good Samaritan largely enjoys a good reputation in Baltimore. One big blemish on its reputation occurred years ago when it was accused by state and federal authorities of falsely documenting that some of its patients were suffering from malnutrition when they were admitted to the hospital.

Why would a hospital do that? According to the allegations, it did so to increase Medicare and Medicaid payments. In this case, if the allegations are true, it was unbelievably clumsy and unethical conduct. The allegedly incorrect diagnoses included patients diagnosed with a rare form of malnutrition you would see in sub-Saharan Africa. No kidding. Good Samaritan denied wrongdoing but paid just over $1 million to settle claims brought by the state of Maryland and the Department of Justice.

Who Owns Good Samaritan Hospital?

Good Samaritan Hospital is part of MedStar Health. The hospital is operated by The Good Samaritan Hospital of Maryland, Inc.

This can become important in a malpractice lawsuit because the proper defendants may include the hospital, an individual doctor, a physician group, nurses, or other healthcare providers depending on what happened.

Where To File Good Samaritan Hospital Medical Malpractice Lawsuits

Most Good Samaritan medical malpractice lawsuits are filed in Baltimore City. The City is one of the preferred venues for medical malpractice cases because of fair judges, a compassionate and smart jury pool, and fast complaint-to-trial deadlines. Baltimore City has been home to at least two exceptional medical malpractice verdicts, including a $55 million verdict and a $21 million verdict.

• A malpractice lawsuit involving nerve damage after a uterine fibroid embolization procedure
• A case filed against Good Samaritan alleging the failure to diagnose and treat properly in the Emergency Room
• Get the details on a wrongful death lawsuit filed against Good Samaritan
• Another lawsuit alleging misdiagnosis left a woman paralyzed
• Learn about a lawsuit against a Good Samaritan nursing home
• Look at the settlement ranges in Maryland malpractice cases

Common Good Samaritan Hospital Medical Malpractice Claims

Good Samaritan is a large hospital providing emergency, surgical, rehabilitation and other medical services. So the malpractice cases that arise there can involve very different types of medical mistakes.

Common hospital malpractice claims include failure to diagnose, emergency room errors, surgical mistakes, medication errors, nursing negligence, falls, pressure sores, infections, and failures to respond when a patient’s condition deteriorates.

A bad medical outcome by itself is not malpractice. The issue is whether a doctor, nurse, or other healthcare provider violated the standard of care and whether that mistake caused an injury.

When Is Good Samaritan Responsible for a Doctor’s Malpractice?

A doctor can work at Good Samaritan without necessarily being an employee of Good Samaritan. So one of the first questions in a hospital malpractice case is who provided the negligent care and what relationship that person had with the hospital.

Good Samaritan can also face claims based on its own conduct, including nursing negligence, inadequate policies, poor communication, or other failures in the systems used to protect patients.

How Long Do You Have to Sue Good Samaritan Hospital?

Maryland has a specific statute of limitations for medical malpractice claims. In general, a malpractice action must be filed within the earlier of five years from the time the injury was committed or three years from the date the injury was discovered. There are different rules for some claims involving children and other limited exceptions.

Do not assume you have five years. The three-year discovery deadline can cut off a claim much sooner, and figuring out exactly when an injury was “discovered” is often a huge battle.  The bottom line is to call a lawyer sooner rather than later, figure out your deadline to file, and then go from there.

Maryland medical malpractice cases also have an extra procedural step. Before most malpractice claims proceed, the claim must first be filed with the Health Care Alternative Dispute Resolution Office. (The filing with that office counts as the filing of the action for limitations purposes.)  This is just an administrative step but one you cannot skip over.  Victims must also file a certificate from a qualified medical expert stating that the healthcare provider violated the standard of care and that the violation caused the injury. The certificate generally must be filed within 90 days after the claim is filed but the best lawyers file it with the certificate of merit.

So, again, if you think something went wrong at Good Samaritan, do not wait until you are close to what you think is the deadline. There is a lot of lead time. Medical records have to be collected, the case has to be reviewed, and an appropriate expert usually has to be found before the lawsuit can really get moving.

What Is a Good Samaritan Hospital Malpractice Case Worth?

There is no average settlement value for a Good Samaritan Hospital malpractice case. Even if we had one, it would not tell you very much. The settlement or trial value depends on the injury, how permanent it is, what future medical care will be required, lost income, and how strong the evidence is that malpractice caused the harm.

The cases that attract medical malpractice lawyers usually involve catastrophic injuries such as brain damage, paralysis, permanent disability, or death because these are the claims that see higher settlements and verdicts. You can see examples of medical malpractice settlement amounts to get a better sense of how these cases are valued, but that is all you are getting: a sense.

Maryland also has a cap on noneconomic damages in medical malpractice cases. That cap limits damages for things such as pain, suffering, and loss of quality of life, but it does not cap economic damages such as future medical expenses and lost wages.

Of course, in a malpractice case, the biggest variable that drives value besides injury is how likely you are to win at trial. A catastrophic injury does not produce a large settlement if there is an impossible case to prove negligence or causation. The strongest cases combine a significant injury with clear evidence that the medical mistake caused an outcome that probably would have been avoided with proper care.

Good Samaritan Hospital’s Defense Team

Good Samaritan has been defended in medical malpractice cases by Daniel Costello of Wharton, Levin, Ehrmantraut, Klein & Nash (Annapolis); Joanna Jesperson of Gleason, Flynn, Emig & Fogleman (Rockville); and Donald L. DeVries of Goodell, DeVries, Leech & Dann, LLP.

These are lawyers who have defended Good Samaritan in past cases. The lawyers defending the hospital can change from case to case.

If you want to serve Good Samaritan Hospital, the hospital entity is:

Good Samaritan Hospital of Maryland, Inc.
5601 Loch Raven Boulevard
Baltimore, Maryland 21239

The hospital has historically listed The Corporation Trust Incorporated as its resident agent. Lawyers should confirm the current resident agent with the Maryland State Department of Assessments and Taxation before serving a lawsuit because resident agent information can change.

Ordering Medical Records from Good Samaritan Hospital

The first step in any medical malpractice case is to order the medical records. If you believe you have a Good Samaritan medical malpractice case, you can either obtain your records yourself, or have your lawyers do it for you. Hospital records can be obtained from:

Good Samaritan Hospital Medical Records Department

5601 Loch Raven Blvd Baltimore, Maryland 21239

(443) 444-3885

In a serious medical malpractice case, you usually want the complete medical record, not just the discharge summary or the documents that appear in a patient portal. Nursing records, medication records, imaging, laboratory results, consultation notes, and other parts of the chart can be important in determining what happened.

Contact Us

If you believe that you have a medical malpractice case against Good Samaritan Hospital, contact our medical malpractice lawyers at 1.800.553.8082, or get a free internet request for consultation.