Verdict Physician is liable for diagnosis without specialist colleague

Doctors are liable for misdiagnosis without consulting peers

02/12/2013

Doctors are liable for a misdiagnosis if they have failed to appoint a specialist colleague. The Association Medical Law of the German Bar Association (DAV) know in this connection to a judgment of the Higher Regional Court Hamm, according to which the judges awarded the son of a deceased on the basis of a misdiagnosis patient inherited 50,000 euros pain (file number: 3 U 122/12).

Doctors should have consulted colleagues for diagnosis
An elderly lady was hospitalized in November 2005 with hemiplegia. There she suffered a seizure. The attending physicians then prompted a computed tomography (CT), but made a crucial mistake: they refrained to consult a neurologist for the evaluation of the images. In the following days, various neurological examinations were performed on the patient. Ultimately, the doctors could only do the diagnosis „Locked-in syndrome“ that developed as a result of unrecognized brain stem infarction. Although the woman was awake, could hear, smell and see, but show no reaction to the eye movement. This condition continued until her death in 2006.

The son of the woman then sued for damages. In the process he was awarded a so-called inherited allowance in the amount of 50,000 euros. According to the court, on the day of admission, the treating physicians failed to consult a neurologist. As a result, it was prevented that a specialist recognized the brain stem infarction and promptly initiated the correct treatment of the patient. According to experts, this omission could have caused the severe paralysis and death of the woman. „According to the other convincing explanations of the neurological expert ... the consequence of the neurologist's diagnosis of an occlusion of the basilar artery would have been the rapid transfer of the patient to a neurological clinic or clinic with a stroke unit. There, a systemic or local lysis treatment with the very good chance of a better result for the patient would have taken place within the still open 12-hour time window“, it says in the opinion. (Ag)