Doctor Settles Lawsuit Alleging Patient's Prostate Cancer Not Curable Due To Doctor's Delay

Male patients often have a lack of understanding of prostate cancer

, their own chances for the cancer, and how to determine if they have prostate cancer. Many men have little, if any, idea of the advantage of screening for prostate cancer or of the guidelines for when they should commence testing, how frequently to screen, and the meaning of screening test results. These men simply put their belief in their physician to tell them what they need to do to stay healthy.

Delayed diagnosis of prostate cancer examples are all too common. One common type of medical error that forms the basis for these cases arises when the male patients family doctor (1) actually screens the individual for prostate cancer by keeping track of the level of PSA (Prostate Specific Antigen) in his system, (2) discovers that the patient has a high PSA level, but (3) neither informs the patient about the abnormal results (and what they mean) nor orders diagnostic tests, like a biopsy, to exclude prostate cancer. Examine the following claim, for instance:

A physician, an internist, found out that his male patient had a PSA of 8. (anything above a 4.0 is normally deemed to be high). The physician did not tell the patient. The physician did not refer the patient to a urologist. The physician failed to order a biopsy. Two years later the physician repeated the PSA test. This time it had gone up to 13.6. Once again, the doctor said nothing to the patient. Again, the physician did not refer the patient to a urologist. And again, the physician did not order a biopsy.

Two years later the physician repeated the PSA test. It was not until three years after first finding out about the patients elevated PSA level that the physician at last advised him that he probably had cancer. By the time he was diagnosed he had metastatic prostate cancer and surgery was not among the treatment alternatives. Instead the man underwent radiation therapy and hormone therapy in an attempt to delay the further progression of the cancer. The law firm handling this matter published that the claim went to mediation and settled in the amount of $600,000.

If they do not do anything when the tests indicate the possiblity of cancer and the patient later finds out that he had prostate cancer and that the lag time resulted in it growing beyond the prostate gland thereby decreasing treatment possibilities and decreasing his likelihood of surviving the cancer, he may have a case for malpractice against the doctor.

by: Joseph Hernandez

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