The below list highlights few common types of errors committed by doctors during treatment:. Misdiagnosis is a type of medical malpractice that refers to both diagnostic error and mistreatment.
Diagnostic errors are misdiagnosis or delayed diagnosis, failure to diagnose, wrong or inappropriate treatment given for a particular condition. If a doctor failed to diagnose you correctly, that mistake could lead to a severe personal injury, including:.
Misdiagnosis may lead to worse health problems requiring more treatment, costing more money, and extending the time frame for getting treatments done. If a doctor gives you a wrong diagnosis, you can file a lawsuit against them under medical malpractice civil tort law. A doctor failing to diagnose a patient suffering from a particular disease could result in delayed or wrong treatment, leading to severe complications or death. Were you or your family member harmed because of a late diagnosis?
If so, you can file a lawsuit against the responsible physician and demand compensation for damages such as pain, suffering, hospitalization charges, etc. Suppose you go to an emergency room complaining of abdominal pains, and the doctor diagnoses you with appendicitis after doing tests like ultrasound examination and CT scan.
But, it turns out later that your appendix was not infected at all. You can sue your doctor for these damages if they are a consequence of their incorrect diagnosis. In some cases, doctors mistake obvious symptoms for something severe and perform unnecessary surgical interventions on people under their care by making incorrect diagnoses. Failure to ask patients reasonable lines of questions surrounding a set of symptoms Failure to interpret lab results per medical standards.
Leaving diagnostic procedures and interpretations in the hands of unqualified professionals. Failure to communicate appropriately with patients, clinicians, and other medical professionals.
Failure to order a test. The symptoms of these conditions may overlap with other illnesses, increasing the difficulty of diagnosis: Sleep apnea. Some physicians may diagnose this oxygen related sleep disorder as depression. Lyme disease. This disease frequently affects people who live in the Northeast and can manifest as many other conditions including fibromyalgia, arthritis, and chronic fatigue syndrome.
Medical negligence claims can be complex, especially if they involve multiple factors, such as various potential causes of an injury. This is a major reason why reliable, professional legal advice is essential in making a misdiagnosis claim. Just as medical conditions vary in their nature and severity, so outcomes for misdiagnosis claims can vary considerably.
The amount of compensation you can expect to receive for a successful claim will depend on the extent of your injury and losses and any costs towards your recovery or further treatment. Your compensation can include costs to cover long-term adaptations you need to make to your living arrangements, for example.
Because these cases can be complex, they can also take time to resolve, but cases that are not settled out of court can typically take three to four years.
But what matters is that you get the compensation you should receive for the misdiagnosis that has caused you injury or suffering. Louise is the Head of the Medical Negligence Team working in this area of law for 25 years. It's not enough to show that the doctor failed to make the right diagnosis.
A medical malpractice case will only be successful if it's shown that the misdiagnosis resulted in harm to the patient. Misdiagnosis or delayed diagnosis may cause harm to the patient in a variety of ways, including:. Learn more about proving a medical malpractice case based on misdiagnosis. Finally, in any medical malpractice case—in any type of lawsuit for that matter—plaintiffs need to be mindful of time limits for going to court and getting the lawsuit process started.
You need to file the initial document the complaint within a certain amount of time after you suffered the harm that led to the lawsuit. These deadlines are set by state laws statutes , so they're called " statutes of limitations. For example, in California, a patient has three years to file a medical malpractice lawsuit after the harm occurs, or one year after the harm is discovered, or should have been discovered whichever comes first.
Learn more about the statute of limitations for medical malpractice lawsuits. The information provided on this site is not legal advice, does not constitute a lawyer referral service, and no attorney-client or confidential relationship is or will be formed by use of the site. The attorney listings on this site are paid attorney advertising.
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