Diagnosis Malpractice

Some medical malpractice cases have little or nothing to do with errors in treatment that was received, but rather that the treatment was simply the wrong type.  This distinction is all too important. Diagnosis malpractice cases involve situations where medical providers may administer the proper treatment for a certain medical condition, but the negligence arises because that condition was based on a wrong diagnosis.

Before exploring types of diagnosis malpractice cases, it is necessary to first understand what a diagnosis is.  A medical diagnosis is an attempt by a medical provider to identify the sickness, illness, or condition affecting a patient.  There are countless factors that go into a medical provider’s diagnosis. Typically, these factors include subjective complaints (what a patient is complaining of such as pain, discomfort, aches, etc.,) laboratory test including blood and urine tests, vital signs such as pulse, oxygen saturation, temperature, respirations, and blood pressure, and finally, a hands-on physical exam.  Some diagnoses are straightforward and simple while others are complex and highly difficult. Typically, a medical provider attempts to diagnose the patient and also provide a differential diagnosis. The differential diagnosis is essentially a medical provider’s next best guess of what this affecting the patient.  It is impossible to underestimate the importance of the diagnosis as that is often where a plan for medical treatment begins. In the event a diagnosis is not made, or is improperly made, the patient reports on a course of treatment that at best is entirely useless and, at worst, dangerous and harmful.

As is true with all New Mexico medical malpractice cases, there are times when a diagnosis mistake may or may not amount to a malpractice case. Medical malpractice law recognizes that there are times when making the correct diagnosis is incredibly difficult. Simply because a medical provider is unable to diagnose a patient’s condition, or does so indirectly, it does not necessarily mean there will be a successful malpractice case. Instead, it is necessary to show that given the information available to the diagnosing medical provider, any other reasonable doctor, nurse, specialist, etc., would have been able to make the correct diagnosis. For this reason, diagnosis malpractice cases often require obtaining the medical records immediately prior to the misdiagnosis or failure to diagnose to determine if any other reasonable medical provider would have been able to properly determine the cause of the patient’s pain or discomfort.

Typical types of New Mexico diagnosis malpractice cases include:

Misdiagnosis malpractice

Failure to diagnose malpractice

Cancer misdiagnosis, and

laboratory mistakes resulting in misdiagnosis.