Failure to Diagnose

What is Failure to Diagnose?

When we go to the hospital or doctor’s office in Hamilton, Middletown, or Eaton, Ohio, it is our expectation that our condition will be diagnosed accurately and then treated appropriately. Unfortunately, many individuals in the United States face the fallout from a failure to diagnose, which can lead to even more serious medical conditions. In the case of a disease like cancer, every second counts and a failure to diagnosis can lead to substantial metastasis. If you were impacted by a medical misdiagnosis, obtain the assistance of our experienced medical malpractice attorneys.

What Constitutes Medical Malpractice in a Failure to Diagnose?

Evaluating a patient’s symptoms is not a foolproof system, and doctors are not expected to make every diagnosis correctly. As such, not every case of misdiagnosis constitutes medical malpractice; only misdiagnosis that falls short of the accepted standard of care constitutes medical malpractice. This means that if another medical professional would have been able to recognize the symptoms of a patient’s condition, the failure to diagnose will likely be found to be malpractice. To constitute medical malpractice, there also must be some type of damage as a result of the failure to properly diagnose the patient. Because it is often particularly difficult to establish that a misdiagnosis constituted malpractice, the assistance of a highly experienced personal injury attorney is often recommended.

The Causes of Medical Misdiagnosis

There are a number of causes of medical misdiagnosis occurs, but some of the most common include:

• Failure to create an adequate follow-up plan
• Failure to obtain an adequate history of the patient
• Failure to order appropriate diagnostic tests
• Failure to properly examine the patient’s conditions
• Incorrectly interpreting test result

Commonly Misdiagnosed or Undiagnosed Medical Conditions

Some of the conditions that we most often see involving a delayed diagnosis include the following:

• Missing the early warning signs of cancer frequently leads to deadly results. This is because cancer has a tendency to spread throughout a person’s body quickly. The later stages of cancer are much more difficult to treat than the early stages.
• Heart disease. Medical problems related to the heart are one of the most common causes of death in the United States. Each year, many people’s heart conditions are not properly diagnosed, which can have fatal consequences.
• While many medical professionals look for numbness on one side of a person’s body as a telltale sign of a stroke. There are many other signs of a stroke. A misdiagnosed stroke can have serious side effects that can significantly change a person’s life and even result in death.

Speak with our Medical Malpractice Lawyers

If you or a loved one has been improperly diagnosed and are now facing a much more serious condition than you would have otherwise, it is important to obtain the assistance of a skilled attorney. At Kruger & Hodges, we understand just how devastating the results of a failure to diagnose can be, and our medical malpractice attorneys will fight for the compensation you deserve. Contact our law offices to schedule an initial free case evaluation.