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About a third of potential claims a Memphis medical malpractice attorney represents every year involves Memphis medical misdiagnosis. A major cause of clinical negligence, diagnostic errors manifest in “delayed treatment or wrong treatment or no treatment,” which in any form contribute to worsening condition of patients. According to the National Patient Safety Foundation, one in every six US residents has been victim of medical diagnostic error at some point of their lives.
A study funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality indicates that 10 to 30 percent of all hospital errors are of medical misdiagnosis category. The American Medical Association maintains that proper diagnosis may save at least four percent of patients dying in hospitals.
Memphis Medical Misdiagnosis: Types
The most common forms of misdiagnosis highlighted in TN medical malpractice lawsuits include
- Improper diagnosis
- Failure to identify a disease on time
- Wrong diagnosis of health problem
- Wrong medication
- Delayed diagnosis
- Failure to identify an existing disorder
- Failure to foresee a side effect
- Failure to refer to proper tests
- Delay in emergency care
- Wrongful birth injury
- Failure to read test reports properly
- Failure to check progression of a disease
- Mistaking symptoms of one disorder for another
Memphis Medical Misdiagnosis: The Cause
Failure to adopt standard care procedure and human error contribute to 90 percent of medical misdiagnosis lawsuits in Tennessee. Lack of training to handle complex or urgent care, improper documentation, inadequate staff, and inattention are among other major causes of diagnosis errors. Though patient’s action can be a factor in misjudgment, doctors’ error is responsible for 80 percent of adverse medical events.
Human error, poorly designed processes, incompetent staff, and faulty processes result in misdiagnosis of diseases. The profit-seeking business model forces doctors to use prolonged hospital stay and practices not required for many patients. Their negligent behavior, due to time pressures and an overall insensitive environment at hospitals, results in unsatisfactory interaction with patients and prescription of medicines outrightly without a patient hearing or reading of test reports.
Medical Misdiagnosis: Proving Your Claim
Medical misdiagnosis is not the sole result of incompetence, but also from the negligence of doctors and unreasonable care. A medical malpractice attorney fighting for a misdiagnosis lawsuit in Memphis must provide the court with evidence to prove that “a doctor in a similar specialty, under similar circumstances, would not have misdiagnosed the patient’s illness or condition.”
Thus, a claim is based on either of two propositions. First, failure to include reasonably accepted and competent diagnosis methods that any skillful health practitioner is expected to adopt. Second, the inability to prescribe or perform appropriate tests to explore the viability of a disorder. A lab is also liable to be sued for medical malpractice misdiagnosis when human or technical error results in inaccurate test findings, a reason for many doctors to make mistakes.
All you claim should be backed by the testimony of a medical expert with qualification equivalent to the defendant.
Memphis Medical Misdiagnosis: Compensation and Damages
The degree and extent of the preventable injury is a deciding factor in claiming compensation. A Tennessee medical malpractice lawsuit claiming misdiagnosis can seek a variety of damages for both tangible and non-tangible injuries, such as financial losses, medical expenditure, wage loss, physical suffering, emotional trauma, etc, apart from punitive compensation.
The state law limits non-economic damages and punitive compensation to $750,000 and $500,000 respectively for all instances except major injuries and wrongful death.
TN Medical Misdiagnosis Lawsuits
In 2009, a Tennessee woman won $24 million in damages following a malpractice claim against a cancer specialist. The failure of the doctor to refer her for more tests resulted in life-threatening conditions. The tumor in her breast was mistaken for a cyst and did not suggest any further test, highlight documents submitted by her Memphis medical malpractice attorney in a city court.
A Memphis jury awarded $33 million to a couple, who claims delayed C-section during child birth for brain damage of their son. The doctors failed to read the condition of the mother requiring immediate surgery and the boy was born with partial brain damage attributed to fetal distress caused by the delay, claimed the medical misdiagnosis lawsuit filed by the parents.
Thirty-three year old Kristen had sued a Hamilton County hospital for wrong medication that led her to suffer from stroke and damage to brain. According to her Tennessee medical misdiagnosis attorney, the gastroenterologist at the hospital prescribed her anti-nausea medications after she complained of pain and vomiting. Contradictions caused by her existing illness resulted in a brain stroke the very next day. She was awarded over $6 million in damages.
Another Tennessee medical misdiagnosis lawsuit fetched $300,000 in damages to a patient, who underwent a gallbladder removal surgery following a wrong diagnosis. Doctors mistook gallstones as tumors and advised him for the surgery.
If you have a claim against any doctor, hospital, or lab, please contact us or call on 1-800-632-1404 to have a free consultation with our experienced Memphis medical malpractice attorney.
Contact a Tennessee Medical Malpractice Lawyer
If you or a loved one in Tennessee, Arkansas or Kentucky believes you are the victim of medical malpractice and have sustained an injury to yourself or your child, infant, parent or loved one, please contact us today.
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