NEW YORK MEDICAL MALPRACTICE-Misdiagnosed Heart Attack

[m015094]

Why is the doctor's responsibility to obtain the previous medical records. Why didn't the patient bring the medical records with him when he went to see the cardiologist? Sound like the patient was also at fault.

[lawmed1]

The patient had no reason to obtain and carry around his medical records since he was told everything was normal. His cardiologist made no effort to review or even confirm the hospital findings.

You would expect that since the heart doctor was treating him for specific complaints of chest pain that he would have made a simple effort to get the test results faxed or emailed to him.

I disagree that the patient had any responsibility. Both hospital & doctor said he was fine. Who was he to argue?

[m015094]

I would stipulate that the patient has EVERY reason to carry his medical records on his person - especially since he was seeing a cardiologist outside the emergent care facility that he initially went to. Are you claiming the patient has no responsibility for his own care?

Also, heart disease is progressive. The fact the man had a heart attack is no proof that his condition was symptomatic (at the time of his exams) to warrant any diagnosis of blockage.

[lawmed1]

The point is that the cardiologist misdiagnosed the patient's stress test. That's the bottom line. If correctly interpreted, he would have had an elective heart bypass surgery, and not suffered a massive heart attack that destroyed most of his heart.

His treating cardiologist missed the clinical symptoms of ischemia which precedes a heart attack. He had the same opportunity to diagnose the clinical condition, and failed to do so.

[zhangpianist]

Do you really think that an experienced cardiologist is stupid after going through 4 years of med school, 5 years of residency, and 2 years of fellowship? Why do you think he screwed up? And how much was he sued for?

[lawmed1]

Do you believe that just because the doctor has gone through his schooling and training means that he's qualified to read and interpret a cardiac stress test?

Would you agree that there are some doctors who are excellent; some are fair; and some are "educationally challenged"? The fact that he misread the stress test, which was objectively confirmed by 3 separate independent cardiologists indicates that he departed from good medical care leading to this young man's tragic and horrific injuries.

[star2000dancer]

@lawmed1 I had exactly the same thing happen to me. Except I only had heartburn, and they ended up almost killing me. In fact I had to go on disability.

[lawmed1]

@star2000dancer That's terrible. I'm sorry to hear that.

[mynamekeisha]

Poor guy, thats a shame. I guess this is proof a second opinion, from a dif dr/specialist, may be good a idea.

[TheDoctorGoat333]

This is not doctorgoat333 but his brother and when I finish med school I will make sure that cases like this are fully investigated and all circumstances and ramifications are fully illustrated. I wish I had all of the charts in front of me. It seems unlikely that however many doctors that he saw could all come to the wrong conclusion. I don't know if the doctors' interpretations were wrong, but the ekg computer interpretation of the results are irrelevant.

[TheDoctorGoat333]

My problem with the video is that the ekg canned results hold no water. The computer's results are given to guide the reader, if correct, in a correct direction. The diagnosis is given by the doctor, not the computer. The problems that the computer finds should be read but disregarded if it looks errorenous. Computers are not yet ready to be a determining factor in medicine. The fact that the computer displayed abnormal ekg is irrelevant and I hope those words were stated in court.

[TheDoctorGoat333]

This video mentioned a cardiologist so somewhere along the line he WAS referred and probably had a perfect stress test. He had no detectable problem. WOW an ekg machine read there was an "abnormal ekg." If I was on that case, that ekg machine would have to be shown to the court that it is riddled with errors. Even the nodes placed on the body can cause the ekg to give abnormal readings. What frustrates the crap out of me is that this video says EVEN the computer said there was a problem.

[lawmed1]

Unfortunately for this patient, his stress test was not normal. In fact, it was markedly abnormal, and the cardiologist who interpreted it clearly failed to read and interpret it correctly.

[TheDoctorGoat333]

A guy who has early repol. may cause the ekg machine to fault and give an abnormal reading. But, since this is a normal condition the machine's code is disregarded. the machine didn't say oh this guy is having a heart attack. It would read "abnormal ekg." If we see an artifact or defect of a sinus P wave (you know what a p wave looks like if you had calculus or read an ecg book), then we refer him to the cardiologist where a stress test and possible catheter use are used for a definitive test

[TheDoctorGoat333]

the ekg machine almost always comes up with a fault "abnormal ekg." Ofcourse we blow it off because we can look at the ekg ourselves. There are not minor details that we can't see that a computer can. The ekg "computer" operating system has faults in itself. EKG can not really detect a heart attack unless you are having one. A scar on the heart is possible, it may cause early repolarization. There are so many noraml abnormal ekgs that the machine gives. The machine's computer simiply unreliable.