Medical Emergencies and Misdiagnosis

Some medical conditions require a faster diagnosis than others. Even though heart disease and cancer are the two leading causes of death in America, most types of cancer take weeks, months, or years before they are fatal. In contrast, heart attacks rank among the most urgent medical conditions. If a heart attack is not diagnosed and treated as quickly as possible, every wasted minute greatly increases the chances that a patient will die.

The first step to treating a medical condition is identifying that condition. Unless a doctor arrives at the correct diagnosis, the patient may not receive the treatment he or she needs to recover. Administering the wrong treatment not only fails to treat the real condition, it can cause harm on its own.

Heart attacks are not the only urgent medical emergency. Meningitis, a life-threatening illness caused by infections in the spine and nervous system, can turn fatal if not diagnosed and treated immediately. Appendicitis is a condition caused by infection of the appendix. Unless the appendix is surgically removed from the abdomen quickly, it may rupture and increase a patient's chance of death.

Most cancers progress more slowly than medical emergencies like heart attacks and meningitis. Misdiagnosing a cancer can lead to the patient receiving powerful medications that cause extremely unpleasant side-effects without treating the cancer. While the seriousness of a cancer misdiagnosis cannot be understated, doctors may have more time to arrive at a correct diagnosis. In this way, there is even less margin of error for doctors who misdiagnose cancer.

Regardless of whether a doctor misdiagnosed a slow-moving illness like cancer or an urgent one like a heart attack, that doctor may be guilty of medical malpractice. Victims of medical malpractice have the right to demand justice. For more information on misdiagnosis and the rights of victims, visit the website of the New Jersey medical malpractice lawyers of Levinson Axelrod, P.A. today.