VA Medical Malpractice Lawyers: Breast Cancer Misdiagnosis and Failure to Diagnose Breast Cancer | Shapiro, Washburn & Sharp

There have been a number of medical malpractice cases in which doctors fail to follow the accepted guidelines that are in place to diagnose cancers such as breast cancer. These failures to diagnose or misdiagnoses can lead to the spread of the cancer, pain and suffering, and even death. Perhaps your doctor did not order a mammogram or other cancer screening despite your age and symptoms. Perhaps your doctor told you a tumor that was malignant was benign. Whatever the case, you should seek legal help immediately if you breast cancer was not properly diagnosed and treated.

In one recent case, a woman went to two doctors concerned over a lump she found in her breast. Both doctors diagnosed her condition as a cyst instead of as stage three cancer. She went to court and sued for medical malpractice due to a misdiagnosis and received a settlement of $4.2 million.

In another story reported by the Boston Herald, a woman went in to her doctor for a routine mammogram. When a non-fluid lump was found, he suggested she come back in a month for a second test. Although the second test revealed that the lump had grown, he refused further testing and did not discover her advanced cancer. Instead, he recommended she use a moist heat treatment three times a day and wait six months before seeking another mammogram. Because of his failure to diagnose her breast cancer correctly, her disease spread to her liver and sternum and has been declared incurable. The hospital was successfully sued for medical malpractice.

In a third story reported by the Mirror, a 28-year-old woman was told she was too young to have breast cancer when she went into a doctor to report that she had found a lump. While her primary care physician told her it was a hormonal lump, a breast-screening center told her it was a cyst. After she was eventually correctly diagnosed, she underwent chemotherapy and a mastectomy. However, she died soon after she began her medical malpractice legal battle with the hospital that missed her cancer diagnosis.