Misdiagnosis of Heart Attack

Most of us, if asked to form a mental image of someone who is at risk of suffering a heart attack, would describe the patient in similar terms.  He is at least 50 years old.  He has plenty of unhealthy habits, such as eating junk food, drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes, and not exercising; he has been committed to these unhealthy habits for a long time.  He is overweight.  If he isn’t retired, he has a stressful yet sedentary job, which may or may not pay well.  For example, he might be a corporate drone, a truck driver, or a school bus driver.  He has a short temper.  The more you ask your interlocutors to describe the typical heart attack patient, the more variation you will get, but almost everyone will assume that the heart attack patient is a man.  This sometimes means that, when women receive a diagnosis of heart attack, they are surprised, because that is not one of the worries that went through their minds when they started having symptoms and decided to go to the emergency room.  A worse consequence, though, is when doctors fail to recognize signs of heart attack in women, especially in young women; this happens more often than you might expect.  If you went to the emergency room, but the doctors told you it was nothing serious, and then your condition got even worse, contact a Fort Lauderdale medical malpractice attorney.

Is It Medical Malpractice If Doctors Fail to Take Your Symptoms Seriously?

Cardiovascular disease, of which the worst possible consequences are heart attack and stroke, is the leading cause of death for women above the age of 65.  Thanks to awareness campaigns, like those posters featuring ladies of a certain age dressed in red, older women are more likely to suspect that they are having a heart attack when they have symptoms.  Doctors and some patients are aware that women are more likely than men to feel heart attack symptoms in the upper abdomen rather than the classic symptom of chest pain.

For younger women, though, heart attack remains a silent killer.  Doctors may not perform the tests that could accurately diagnose a heart attack simply because the patient is a woman under the age of 50.  A woman from another state eventually had to undergo a heart transplant after suffering a heart attack at age 24, while she was pregnant.  She went to three hospital emergency rooms, but in the first two cases, the doctors assumed that her nausea and the feeling of tightness in her chest were simply pregnancy symptoms.  They assumed that a woman who was young enough and healthy enough to be pregnant could not have a heart attack.  In many cases, the standard of care requires testing to rule out life-threatening conditions even when they are not the most obvious possible explanation for the patient’s symptoms.

Set Up a Consultation Today

A personal injury lawyer can help you if you suffered injuries because of medical malpractice arising from a missed diagnosis.  Contact Boone & Davis in Fort Lauderdale, Florida or call 954-566-919 to explore your potential recovery options today.

Source:

taosnews.com/news/health/medical-malpractice-debate-ongoing-in-nm/article_c3418183-a260-53c7-83cd-89b21c2ab191.html