Can You Sue a Doctor for Misdiagnosis?

This video features Lyle Griffin Warshauer, an Employment and Labor Law attorney based in Georgia.

Attorney Lyle Warshauer | 888-981-5602 | Free Consult

“In the most extreme situation, for example if you don’t diagnose that someone’s having a heart attack, they’re probably not going to survive that episode.”

Misdiagnosis is a common form of medical malpractice. This could take the form of a misread blood test, a misinterpreted X-ray, or failure to perform a test that the medical community at large would agree should have been performed.

Can you sue a doctor for misdiagnosis? To learn more, we spoke to Lyle Griffin Warshauer, an injury attorney based in Atlanta, Georgia. She recommends contacting a lawyer if you suspect that a doctor failed to diagnose your condition correctly or in a timely manner.

Attorney Warshauer is senior partner and co-founder of Warshauer Law Group.

To learn more, contact the attorney directly by calling 888-981-5602 or by submitting a contact form on this page. There is no charge for the consultation, and you never owe any out-of-pocket attorney fees.

Key Takeaways From Lyle Warshauer:

Medical misdiagnosis is an observational error in which a medical professional who should have identified or taken the steps to correctly identify a patient’s condition fails to do so, resulting in harm to the patient.

This could include the results of a test being misinterpreted or failing to order a standard test based on the patient’s age and situation. Misdiagnoses are common in emergency room situations where tension is high, but also with standard medical care from a doctor with which the patient has an established relationship.

Misdiagnosis could occur for a variety of reasons.

Negligence occurs when a medical provider fails to provide the same degree of care that another provider in a similar circumstance would reasonably provide; this depends on what the medical team could or should know. However, if a patient refuses a test because they cannot afford it or because their insurance does not cover it, or for any other personal reason, a doctor is limited in what they can do. Sometimes misdiagnoses occur when a doctor correctly orders a test for their patient, but the specialist performing the test fails to do so adequately and/or misinterprets the result. In which case the first doctor has not been negligent but the specialist reading the test could be.

While equipment failure does occur, human error is more common.

Like any equipment, medical equipment has the potential to break, cease working effectively, or be defective. However, the medical professionals trained to use that equipment are expected to know how to identify flaws in the equipment. Like with any product, human error is the more common cause of ineffective equipment. If a medical professional fails to notice that a piece of equipment is not working properly, that professional could be held liable for resulting harm to the patient.

Medical misdiagnosis causes harm to patients.

Failing to diagnose a patient correctly could cause serious injury to a patient. If a serious condition is misdiagnosed as something else, they very well might not receive the treatment they need in time, or could receive incorrect treatment which actually exacerbates the issue. Some conditions worsen with time when not treated, like cancer, so a failure to diagnose it in a timely manner could result in that patient’s chances of recovery from the condition being extremely decreased.

Attorneys who handle medical malpractice and personal injury cases typically work on contingency.

This means that an injured party will not owe their legal team any money until and unless their attorney wins their case, in which the attorney would be paid a percentage of that compensation. This allows for patients who have suffered from medical malpractice to avoid finding themselves buried under legal bills on top of their medical bills. It’s important for patients who have suffered from misdiagnosis or any other medical malpractice to focus on healing and recovery; letting an experienced attorney who knows how to litigate these cases do so on your behalf allows that healing and recovery to take place.

To learn more, contact Lyle Warshauer directly by calling 888-981-5602 or by submitting a contact form on this page. There is no charge for the consultation, and you never owe any out-of-pocket attorney fees.

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