Medical Malpractice › NYC Boroughs
Patients harmed by negligent medical care in Queens face the same New York rules as everyone else in the state, with one practical difference that matters a great deal: which hospital treated you decides how much time you have to act. This page covers the deadlines, the Queens hospitals that appear most often in these claims, and where a case is filed.
New York gives most medical malpractice claimants two years and six months from the date of the negligent act, or from the end of continuous treatment for the same condition, under CPLR 214-a. That is shorter than the three year deadline that applies to ordinary personal injury claims in New York, and the difference catches people out.
Several rules change that date:
Because these rules interact, the safest assumption is that your deadline is sooner than you think. A short conversation is usually enough to identify which one governs your situation.
Queens is served heavily by two NYC Health + Hospitals facilities, which means the 90 day notice requirement applies to a large share of claims arising in the borough.
Whether a hospital is public or private changes the deadline, the pre suit steps and often the defendant itself. If you are not sure which category applies to the facility that treated you, ask before assuming you have the full two and a half years.
Medical malpractice claims arising from care in Queens are typically brought in Queens County Supreme Court. Venue is not automatic, and in cases involving multiple providers across more than one borough there is often a choice to make. That choice is worth making deliberately rather than by default.
The medicine varies, but every claim has to establish the same things: the standard of care that applied, how the care given departed from it, and that the departure caused the injury. These are the areas covered in depth on this site:
Generally two years and six months under CPLR 214-a, measured from the negligent act or from the end of continuous treatment for the same condition. If a NYC Health + Hospitals facility was involved, a notice of claim is generally due within 90 days, which is the deadline that most often causes a claim to be lost.
Venue usually follows where the treatment took place or where a party resides, so a claim arising from care in Queens is commonly brought in Queens County Supreme Court.
No. Bring what you have. Records can be requested on your behalf, and a review normally starts with the timeline of what happened and when you learned something had gone wrong.
A poor result on its own is not malpractice. Medicine carries known risks even when it is done correctly. A claim requires showing that the care fell below the accepted standard and that the departure caused the harm, which is why these cases are built on expert medical review.
An initial case review is free. Call (212) 344-1000 to speak with someone about what happened.
If you believe you or a family member were harmed by medical care, the first step is a conversation about the timeline. Call (212) 344-1000 for a free case review. There is no fee unless we recover for you.
