$12,000,000 Jury Verdict For Patient After Physicians Misdiagnosed Her Breast Cancer

One of the principal tools available to assist doctors in saving the lives of female

patients is the mammogram, a test that checks for evidence of possible cancer in the breast, letting doctors to find the cancer in its early stages. Still, the mammogram is only as reliable as the physician who interprets it. In the event that the doctor misreads the mammogram the cancer can be undetected until a subsequent mammogram or until a lump is found during a breast examination. While in this time, the cancer may become advanced. By reaching an advanced stage, the woman has a lowered five year survival rate. Consequently the likelihood of her passing away of the cancer increase considerably.

Look into the published lawsuit of a woman who had a routine mammogram and was told that there was no indication of cancer. Roughly 2 years afterward, the patient underwent another mammogram. This time the mammogram was interpreted as displaying no change to the dilated duct from the earlier mammogram. But, the prior mammogram was free of a dilated duct and hence the physicians did nothing to explore the suspicious change from the earlier, clean, mammogram. Her mammogram was misinterpreted and her cancer was not detected. When the woman had a subsequent mammogram done at another hospital the coming year, the doctor interpreting the mammogram described several small nodular densities. The physician documented that these remained unchanged from the past mammograms. Yet, both of the earlier mammograms included no signs of nodular densities. Again, her mammogram was misinterpreted and again her cancer was not diagnosed.

Ultimately it was discovered that the patient did have breast cancer, but by then it had metastasized having already spread. It was additionally discovered that the spot that had previously been described as a dilated duct was location of the primary tumor. The woman initiated a medical malpractice case against both physicians and hospitals. The doctor and hospital that interpreted the third mammogram as evidencing small nodular densities payed out an undisclosed sum in an amount less that the $2,000,000 available in insurance coverage. The physician and hospital that misread the prior mammogram refused to settle for the full amount of the policy. They were willing to pay only a mere $125,000. The case went to trial where evidence was introduced that had the mammogram not been misread the cancer might have been discovered while still a Stage 1 cancer, which generally has a 5 year survival rate higher than 90%. The law firm that handled the lawsuit reported that the jury came back with a verdict of $12.0 million.

This is a good matter to examine for a number of reasons. To begin, two separate mammograms were misread by 2 distinct physicians at two different hospitals. Also the two physicians attributed findings to earlier mammograms which were actually not present in those earlier mammograms. It is tough to figure out how this might have occurred unless the physicians both compared the mammogram they were examining to a different patients mammogram. However the likelihood of this occurring twice at two separate hospitals is extremely improbable. But the amount of carelessness that would be needed otherwise is truly unexcusable. In this case, the jury seems to have agreed.

by: J. Hernandez

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