Failure to Timely Diagnose Cancer

Receiving a diagnosis of cancer is a life changing event. The Kentucky Cancer Registry shows that about 521 or every 100,000 people in the state of Kentucky are living with some form of invasive cancer. If the cancer was misdiagnosed or not diagnosed in a timely manner by a physician, it can have even greater consequences. Early diagnosis is the most effective weapon a patient has when battling cancer.

Delays can mean much more invasive treatment or even death. Cancers are staged (stage I, stage II, etc.) and with each stage comes an increased likelihood of recurrence (the cancer coming back) and a decreased prognosis (likelihood of survival). Additionally, the longer a cancer tumor grows, the more time it has to metastasize or spread. Obviously, a cancer that spreads is more difficult to treat.

Types of Cancer Misdiagnosis

In the past twenty years, more Americans have died from cancer than the combined casualties from the world’s major wars and conflicts. In fact, Kentucky has the highest mortality rates from cancer in the nation (based on 2007 data). Additionally, Kentuckians have a 50% higher rate for lung cancer than other Americans. Statistics like these indicate the importance of proactive cancer treatment and diagnosis in the bluegrass state.

Some of the common areas of cancer misdiagnoses include:

How do Doctors Fail to Diagnose Cancer?

When medical professionals fail to timely diagnose cancer, it can be a case of medical malpractice if the doctor is negligent in his or her care.

Misdiagnosis or delayed cancer diagnosis may be the result of many factors:

• Failure or delay in ordering proper diagnostic testing
• Failure to interpret test results correctly
• Errors in laboratory or radiology procedures/processing
• Incorrect diagnosis of the patient’s symptoms
• Failure to refer a patient to a specialist

While less common, misdiagnosis can also happen when a doctor diagnoses a patient with cancer, when in fact, the patient is cancer free. In these cases of medical malpractice, patients may have suffered anxiety, incurred huge medical costs and endured cancer treatments that were completely unnecessary.