Some Reasons Patients Are Misdiagnosed

Because medical misdiagnoses often occur nowadays, Connecticut patients may do well to obtain a second opinion from other physicians. Besides the fact that there are more than 20,000 different diseases, other factors can lead to a misdiagnosis, as there are many reasons for misdiagnosis. So While sometimes patients are to blame for a misdiagnoses, such as if they are too embarrassed to tell their doctor all their symptoms, or they attempt to diagnose their illness on their own, many misdiagnoses occur because of a doctor’s fault. For instance, many doctors become familiar with a certain disease they frequently treat and could give the wrong diagnosis to someone who has similar symptoms but a different disease.

Further, many doctors try to save their patients the cost of expensive tests that the majority of people with common diseases will not need. However, the test could be crucial for the small percentage of patients who are suffering with an extremely rare condition.

Misdiagnoses are also the result of the fact that most doctors only spend roughly 15 minutes with each patient, which leaves little time for in-depth discussions about the patient’s condition and makes giving a tentative diagnosis more difficult. In many cases, most doctors make a diagnosis that fits most common diseases but may be confused over rarer conditions. Human error further plays a role in many misdiagnoses as well. Medical professionals may confuse samples or do the test procedure incorrectly. In other cases, samples can get contaminated. Then there are diagnostic tools that could fail, such as pathology and laboratory tests that can sometimes produce wrong results.

While physicians can make errors, they could still be held liable if their misdiagnosis of a disease causes serious physical harm to a patient. Victims of a negligent doctor or another medical professional may wish to pursue damages by filing a medical malpractice lawsuit with the help of an attorney.

Source: Right Diagnosis, “Why Does Misdiagnosis Occur?“, Feb. 27, 2017