Tag: Evidential Damage

Lost Chances to Recover: An Elaboration

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By Alex Stein

An important development of the lost-chance doctrine recently took place in Rash v. Providence Health & Services, — P.3d —- (Wash.App.Div.3 2014).

An 82-year old patient with a critical heart condition was hospitalized to undergo surgery. The patient’s heart condition made her death inevitable, but she managed to prolong her life with the help of medications. The hospital negligently failed to give the patient blood pressure medications. As a result, the patient suffered a series of strokes from which she died. The hospital’s negligence thus accelerated the patient’s demise.

The patient’s heirs sued the hospital for medical malpractice. The patient’s preexisting condition doomed the plaintiffs’ claim that the hospital’s negligence was the but-for cause of her death. The plaintiffs consequently demanded compensation for the lost chance of  better outcome, pursuant to Herskovits v. Grp. Health Coop. of Puget Sound, 664 P.2d 474 (Wash. 1983); and Mohr, 262 P.3d 490 (Wash. 2011). Read More

The Law of Breast Cancer

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By Alex Stein

During an annual mammogram screening for breast cancer, the radiologist detects a nodule in the patient’s breast. The nodule is large enough to require a biopsy, but the radiologist prefers to schedule a follow-up appointment with the patient for six months later. This appointment reveals that the nodule had grown and the radiologist refers the patient to a biopsy. The biopsy is carried out four days later by a surgeon. The surgeon determines that the nodule was malignant and diagnoses the patient with breast cancer. The patient consults two breast cancer specialists who unanimously recommend mastectomy and chemotherapy. These procedures and the ancillary treatments prove successful. They make the patient cancer free in one year. The chemotherapy caused the patient to experience hair loss, pain, nausea, headaches and fatigue, but all these symptoms are now gone as well.

The patient is happy with the result but is still upset. She believes that a timely discovery of her cancer would have given her a far less painful and less disfiguring treatment option: lumpectomy followed by radiation therapy.

Can the patient successfully sue the negligent radiologist? Read More