New York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Robert Sullivan brings courtroom cases studies on the web. Mineola, New York (NewYorkInjuryNews.com) — One of the worst health related tragedies that can occur is the misdiagnosis of a heart attack. In this day and age you would think with all the sophisticated medical procedures and equipment that we have, that these kinds of stories would be unheard of – but it happened to a lady who died because before modern technology could do its job, there must be a human to turn the switch on. And as we know, humans make mistakes.
Susan (not her real name) was an obese 30 year-old smoker who went into the emergency room complaining of chest pain, dizziness and shortness of breath. Although her EKG was normal, no blood enzyme was performed on her, which can tell the doctors if there is a heart problem.
During the course of the case (brought on Susan’s behalf), the doctor testified that he did not think it was a heart attack because he thought that she must have pulled a chest muscle at work (however, he never actually recorded that in Susan’s chart), so he basically gave her a pain killer and told her to return if she had anymore chest pain – only a slight variation on “take two aspirins and call me in the morning”. Unfortunately, two days later she died of a heart attack.
An independent cardiologist was brought in as an expert to examine what was done and not done. The expert found that given her obesity and history of smoking coupled with complaints of chest pain, shortness of breath and dizziness that the doctor should not have been satisfied with a normal EKG and should have ordered a blood enzyme to follow up on whether there was a possibility that she could have had a heart attack which could have been treated preemptively. This was one of these cases where eventually the hospital settled before a jury settled it for them.
Contributor: Robert Sullivan – Prominent Long Island medical malpractice lawyer, medical & general negligence attorney in New York State handling personal injury cases.
