Medical negligence is a specific subset of tort law that deals with professional negligence. “Tort” is the Norman word for “wrong,” and tort law is a body of law that creates and provides remedies for civil wrongs that are distinct from contractual duties or criminal wrongs. “Negligence” is generally defined as conduct that falls short of a standard; the most commonly used standard in tort law is the so-called “reasonable person” standard. The reasonable person standard is a legal fiction, created so that the law can have a baseline standard of reasoned conduct that a person in similar circumstances would, or would not do, to protect another person from a foreseeable risk of harm.