CASE STUDY 1: Failure To Diagnose Breast Cancer

Curan & Ahlers was asked to help a forty year old woman in Brooklyn, New York, regarding a condition that was not diagnosed properly. The woman had a mammogram performed at a hospital and was told that everything in the images looked good. She went home and didn’t think about it. About a year later, however, she palpated a lump in the same breast that the mammogram was performed on. She returned to the hospital and it was determined that the lump was on the image all along and that someone failed to inform her of this and the result was that she had cancer.

 

Curan & Ahlers then brought a “failure to diagnose” malpractice lawsuit against the hospital and clinic on her behalf. As a result of the suit not only was the woman compensated for this terrible mistake, but as part of the settlement the policy of the hospital was changed to ensure that people would be properly informed when there was any kind of damaging evidence found on a mammogram. The long-term hope is that in the future, women would be spared the trauma and possible life-threatening consequences of this avoidable mistake.