Failure to diagnose or treat can be difficult to prove

You trust your doctor to take good care of you. When you went into his or her office with complaints associated with a medical issue, you probably expected the doctor to make a diagnosis and issue a treatment plan. While that does happen in most cases, there are some cases in which a doctor fails to diagnose a patient or fails to adequately treat a medical condition. These can both be very serious issues.

If you were harmed by a failure to diagnose or a failure to treat, you might decide that you are going to take steps to hold the doctor accountable. This can be done through a medical malpractice lawsuit, and getting your case together so you can file is important.

Failure to diagnose and treat cases can often be complex. You have to prove that the doctor you saw should have been able to make an accurate diagnosis with the information that was available. This is where standard of care comes into the picture.

Standard of care means that you can’t expect a small town doctor with limited medical testing means to make a diagnosis in the same manner as a doctor who works in a state-of-the-art facility. In other words, a small town doctor wouldn’t be held to the same standard as a renowned oncologist is your case involves a misdiagnosis of a rare form of cancer.

Even if you did get an accurate diagnosis, there isn’t a guarantee that you will be treated properly. Failing to treat a condition could lead to harm and is treated much the same as a misdiagnosis if you opt to seek compensation. You would have to show that a doctor put in the same scenario as what your doctor was in with your case wouldn’t have treated you in the same manner as how your doctor treated you.

Making these accusations is fairly easy, but you will have to back them up as part of your case. While this can be difficult, it doesn’t have to be impossible.

Source: FindLaw, “Failed/Erroneous Diagnosis and Treatment,” accessed Sep. 16, 2016