There may be no professional that we place more trust in than our doctor. When our health is in jeopardy, we trust medical professionals to utilize their extensive education, training and experience to identify our conditions and propose accurate courses of treatment.
Unfortunately, there are times when doctors and other hospital workers make mistakes. In too many tragic cases, these mistakes mean the difference between life and death; between being healthy and being ill. Holding doctors accountable for these mistakes is something that every victim of medical malpractice may want to consider as it could prevent the mistake from happening again and result in compensation that a victim needs to recover from an error. One woman may be exploring her legal options after she was misdiagnosed with cancer and underwent dramatic and ultimately unnecessary surgery.
Reports indicate that the woman’s doctor told her that she had breast cancer. Like many other women who have received this horrific news, the woman wanted to do whatever possible to remove the cancer and save her life. She underwent an operation to have both of her breasts removed.
After the surgery, the woman experienced numerous infections and had to have even more surgeries to correct and remedy some of the complications stemming from the original procedure. But far and away, the worst part was that the surgery and the subsequent problems were all completely unnecessary: She learned that she never actually had breast cancer.
The woman had been misdiagnosed. Like more than 440,000 people who get sick or die every year, she was the victim of a preventable medical error.
Of course we all know that people make mistakes. But when that mistake puts another person’s life or health in danger, it can be crucial to hold a negligent or reckless party accountable. Legal action and money cannot repair the damage of a medical error or undo something as serious as an unnecessary amputation, but it can help victims and their families cope with the resulting damages and try to find a sense of closure after such a devastating experience.
Source: Take Justice Back, “Medical error leads to unnecessary surgeries, suffering,” accessed on July 29, 2014
