South Carolina Personal Injury Law Blog
These days, to maintain your health, you have to be proactive. If you can manage it, exercising is a good idea, and getting regular medical checkups could be crucial to preventing or properly treating an illness. However, even when patients do try to cover their bases and seek preventative care, sometimes medical professionals fail in their duties and misdiagnose an illness.
That was the case for one woman who in 2007 underwent her first mammogram. She thought she was being proactive about her health, but she undoubtedly came away from the experience worried. A calcification about the size of a nickel was revealed in her right breast.
Another screening was scheduled, and the doctor delivered the news that the growth was benign. She has since filed a lawsuit claiming that doctors made the same diagnosis two years later, then again in 2010 and 2011.
However, in 2012 the woman’s patient file was randomly selected for review. Another doctor contradicted the previous diagnoses after finding that the mass in the woman’s breast had grown a great deal. A biopsy indicated that the growth was cancer.
Shortly thereafter, the woman had to undergo a full mastectomy. According to her attorney, a doctor told the woman that if the cancer hadn’t been detected during the random review, she would have lived only another six months. Now the woman has brought a claim of negligence against the radiology company.
If a doctor tells you that an irregular calcification in your body is benign, then you should be able to trust that diagnosis. Unfortunately, cancer misdiagnoses happen all too often, and patients need to be aware of their right to hold negligent medical professionals accountable.
Source: KRQE.com, “Lawsuit: Woman victim of misdiagnosis,” Kayla Ayres, May 25, 2014