Doctor misdiagnosed cancer as pneumonia, what can I do about it?

Family doctors are like using swiss army knives to an electrical problem.

Specialists might not be better off (don't talk to me about ENT's or ophtalmologists...), but they supposedly have a deeper knowledge of the affected area.

Seriously man, if you walked in with a tennis ball scrote, would you be satisfied with the family doctor feeling you up and giving you a note for Robitussin?

I'd nut up (last and only pun), and get that schit scanned by someone who could.

 

Supposedly? Explain...

 

What does it sound like? They've sucked up a lot of my money trying to figure out how to solve a problem. It's better than other alternatives, but the OP came in with the assumption that an initial diagnosis is always right.

While specialists, they're still human, therefore infallible. A second opinion doesn't hurt.

 

Did they attempt to solve your problem? Did they take the necessary steps that are standard of care to address your symptoms? And did you take their advice and follow through with their recommendations?

 

If you feel like he was negligent then you could talk to the Texas Medical Board and file a complaint. If they get enough problems with the doctor and feel like he is harming patients then they can pull his licence if he doesn't improve his quality. :http://www.tmb.state.tx.us/consumers/DisciplinaryProcess.php

As to how you could get these two confused I suppose if it was a mass in the lungs he may have thought it was a lung abscess or something (Would still be dumb to mistake the two). There is really no way to tell without seeing the chest xray and hearing the full history of your brother's illness up to that point.

 

I have sleep apnea diagnosed from a sleep specialist, so one of the mitigating factors is to see an ent. The first guy didn't see a deviated septum but noticed polyps that he could remove 'on the spot' to improve breathing. I was in the middle of switching jobs, so I deferred months later until my coverage came back. (quick recovery)

Later, I went to a second specialist who wanted to slice open my palate to increase breathing space after one brief physical examination without any expensive scopes or tubing. I took it into consideration, but subsequent research confirmed his caveat that doing the procedure doesn't guarantee more breathing during sleeping. (medium though tedious recovery)

I took a second opinion, and initially told the third ENT nothing about the second diagnosis, and he recommended a regimen to reduce allergy symptoms with varying degrees of anti-histamines and steroids over time. (not invasive)

Those were three different diagnoses that could presumably solve the problem, yet they'd all be the first to guarantee nothing (as they should) despite sounding very confident that it's the 'best option' before exhausting others. None of the ENTs agreed with each other's diagnoses after coming to their initial conclusion.

Very similar experiences with my reoccurring corneal erosion over the span of 8 years, though in that case, the remedies were fewer so they were more "experimental"...with me as a guinea pig.

On topic, in malpractice suits, it's generally not the skill or fault of the doctor that spurs litigation, but rather his or her bedside manner. Diagnosing human problems is very complex, so I'm not trashing doctors at all. You have to do your part and not put all your eggs in one basket

 

I'm glad that you were able to get treated, and I'm glad that you realize that diagnosing medical conditions is difficult. You say you're not trying to trash doctors, but it still seems like you harbor some resentment towards the specialists that you've seen.

Medical conditions come in all sorts of forms and fashions. Many conditions are never classical by-the-book. The same thing goes with treating diseases. There are different ways to treat a disease, and in that fashion, each ENT you saw has their preferred method for treatment based on their findings. Nothing in medicine is guaranteed, and that goes for diagnoses and treatment. As long as there is scientific medical literature to support the treatment and it doesn't harm a patient, it can be a valid treatment option.

Sorry if I've derailed the thread, but I feel that this is an important point to state. It applies to the OP and others in this thread that feel the family physician should be omniscient about the brother's condition. Doctor's exams are guided by a patient's signs and symptoms, and if your brother didn't mention a huge testicular growth, the physician would have no reason to suspect testicular cancer.

It's already been mentioned, but what you should do is report this incident to the Texas Medical Board. If they get enough complaints, they'll audit the records and look to see if the physician was negligent.

 

I'm skeptical over the credibility of one specialist, let alone GPs.

I'm not a fan of doctors recommending invasive procedures with ostensible certainty when they could presumably know a host of other competing treatments that they've scratched off but fail to mention to you.

I don't know how other people took my posts in the topic, but they should be skeptical as well.

If you took it as me saying not to visit specialists, I'm saying to visit more than one.

 

So I am a physician. So you can understand my perspective. We all make mistakes, and some conditions are not diagnosed quickly or easily. The statement that "he had testicular cancer and was diagnosed with pneumonia" paints a certain picture, but it simply cant be that simple. Did he have respiratory symptoms and complain of this? Did he divulge that he had testicular swelling etc? Did he tell his physician about these symptoms?

Also, it is very very common for lung cancers to present as recurrent pneumonia.

If you are concerned, did you talk to this doctor about this? If there is a pattern, complain to his group or the state board.