Whilst a cancer diagnosis is an increasingly common event in an ageing population, complaints regarding mistreatment and a lack of care are actually reassuringly uncommon.
Unfortunately there are occasions when treatment does not go as planned. The major difficulty which gives rise to a cause of action is undoubtedly delay in diagnosis and treatment. It is also true that the most common causes of delay are preventable. Many of the difficulties that we see as lawyers would be avoided if doctors maintained a high index of suspicion and sought to exclude all potentially serious causes of a patient’s new complaint.
Delay may be attributable to a number of reasons; a failure on the part of the patient to adequately report symptoms, inadequate examination or test, inexperienced staff, common symptomology or misinterpretation of test results.
O’Reilly Stewart Healthcare lawyers have handled many clinical negligence cases relating to the delay in diagnosis or mistreatment of cancer.
If you have suffered injury and loss by virtue of misdiagnosed or delayed diagnosis, please contact us by phone on 028 9032 1000 for free advice about making a claim.
