Galit Kerner & Co. Law Offices

Galit Kerner & Co. Law Office was founded in 2002 by Adv. Galit Kerner. The firm has many years of experience in representing victims and specialization in complex and severe injuries as a result of medical malpractice. The office has a special, open and reliable dialogue with the different media outlets that often act as a voice channel to those injured victims.
The firm is headed by Adv. Galit Kerner, married and mother of three, who lives in Hod HaSharon and is the founder of the Galit Kerner & Co Law Office. The firm that leads the change of the abiding norms of various medical bodies as well as vis-à-vis relevant government offices with an emphasis on the attitude towards medical conduct, on ethical issues and on the whole set of legal rules that regulate the meeting between a patient and a doctor, a civilian and an authority. Adv. Kerner also deals with the interaction and the duty that stems from a meeting between a doctor and the healthcare system, including the interaction vis-à-vis the different government ministries that are trusted with the benefit of the public/the disabled/the sheltered respectively.

Innovative Legal Leadership

The extensive activity of Adv. Kerner has put her, over the years, at the front of an innovative legal leadership, and the firm she heads represents only private plaintiffs for medical negligence – mainly representing children in some of the most difficult and complex cases there are. The office acts with sensitivity out of a sense of mission for the victims of medical negligence and works with determination without fear or impartiality opposite the institutional elements in order to change the norm of offensive conduct to maximize the compensation in the circumstances of the damage.

Professional Experience of Over 26 Years:

Many Public and Voluntary Roles
Adv. Kerner started her way back in 1997, and has over 26 years of experience in the field of medical negligence and expertise in Insurance Law, Class Actions and regulatory representation in the field of Health. She acts as (joint) chairperson of the Central District Torts Committee of the Israel Bar Association, (joint) chairperson of the National Medical Malpractice Committee of the Israel Bar Association and lectures in conventions and continuing education programs of different bodies including on behalf of MEDICAL-EXPO.
Additional positions of Adv. Kerner are: a licensed mediator, graduate of mediation course of the Isreal Bar Association (2007), adviser and lecturer on behalf of the Israel Bar Association on the topic of medical malpractice and insurance, volunteer consultant for various associations (“Sicuy Shaveh”/Williams Syndrome patients/”Reimm”), volunteer at the Kfar-Saba “Alumim” youth village- A dormitory for children and teenagers at risk. She also served voluntarily as chairperson of “Agudat Hayedidim” of the Etagrim association, participated in medical continuing education programs for jurists, wrote articles in the doctors’ forum Gmed and served as an adviser to the Ministry of Defense on the subject of life insurance. Adv. Kerner participates as a commentator in television programs as an expert in Medical Law and is a member of Board 4 MEDONNA to promote women’s health equality by improving and leading processes to reduce health disparities in Israel. Founder of a start-up of a digital platform to promote dialogue and communication between people in family disputes.

Representation in Complex and Publicized Cases

The office of Galit Kerner & Co is specializing in the fields of malpractice during pregnancy and giving birth, delay in diagnosing serious illnesses and medical negligence in surgery. The firm has led, in the last years, the most complex and publicized cases in those fields including class actions with regard to medical damages (Materna, Dermalosophy, Assuta etc.). Among others, the firm represented the pregnant woman and the baby in the affair of the embryo exchange in the resounding failure of Assuta medical center, a class action in the matter was served by the firm against Assuta, as well as the tort claim against the state in the Zadorov affair, along with Adv. Yarom Halevy.
Another significant case was the representation of the Harazi family in the affair of detaching the father of the family from the ventilator during the time of the Covid-19 pandemic. Following the exposure of the affair in the media, a national refresher for proper use was given, and measures were taken, like a refresher for the medical staff and adjusting the equipment accompanying the machine (the breathing tube that is detached and separately initiated by the hospital and is not related to the machine itself).
The office has voluntarily led, during the Covid crisis, the famous petition to the High Court against the Ministry of Welfare for equal rights for 18,200 children with special needs in out of home housing, who stayed locked up in the out of home housing, even after the decision of the Ministry of Health to cancel the lockdown to the entire citizens of the country. For some reason the Ministry of Welfare decided then that the sheltered in the out of home housing are not equal rights citizens and the lockdown continued for them eight weeks after it was finished for the entire state citizens(!). This led, for the first time, to a change in the Ministry of Welfare’s instructions and the duty of transparency vis-à-vis parents and sheltered, as well as subjecting its decisions to the Ministry of Health’s directives.
In light of the case, and only after the firm’s demand, for the first time a doctor in the field of public health was appointed as the Public Commissioner at the Ministry of Welfare. Later on, the firm assisted in advising on the establishment of a national organization for the parents of children with special needs, in order to change “the balance of terror” between the parents’ weakness and the welfare, all for the benefit of ten of thousands of helpless patients.
Galit Kerner & Co Law Office also led a special session in the Israel Bar Association convention in Eilat, together with Adv. Rafi Twizer, a legal adviser in The Medical Professions Ombudsman in the Ministry of Health and a member of the medical malpractice examination committees, about the conduct and duty of the Ministry of Health in changing medical policy by way of establishing examination committees for exceptional cases. Also, the firm established a unique research department to examine the model of negligent conduct as well as an in-depth examination of the professional literature and/or the relevant governmental instructions for the field in which the injury occurred or the default was committed.

The Firm’s Vision

The office raised the banner of applying the existing obligations in practice and/or to sharpen them in a way that will benefit patients and the public as a whole, to correct injustices against the public, to prevent health risks and to improve the service and response provided to the public in the various health institutions. All this while the firm brings to a significant change in implementing the duty of the reasonable and optimal care, according to the procedures and to the binding treatment protocols for every person, and for the benefit of every soul in Israel, all in order to prevent the next future injustice.