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

it sucks that it was your brother but it was a mistake. no doctor wants to misdiagnose anyone. and unless he has track record of doing so, trying to ruin his livelihood is immoral and won't accomplish anything. he did right by getting a second opinion.

 

You want advice on a message board about what you should do about a mis-diagnosis from ten years ago that's already been treated by another doctor?

Move on.

 

Maybe the lab people messed up with the bx.

 

well, you didn't state his review history. if it's a common thing then he shouldn't be practicing anymore.

 

Waiting 10 years to do it would make you immoral if you truly believe that.

It's probably strictly about money though.

 

The story is quiet confusing. What does pneumonia have anything to do with testicular mass? Are you saying that because your brother was feeling ill, the doctors thought saw an lobar infiltrate on Chest X-ray that he assumed was pneumonia rather than metatasis? Or are you saying the doctor just never worked up the enlarging testicular mass or fail to notice it?

 

I am highly impressed this thread got to 10 posts without a joke about tennis-sized testicles.

 

Odd timing to bring something up 10 years ago, unless you've been hearing stories from other patients about misdiagnose or ineptitude and would like to do something about it.

My guess is to contact your local medical board to see what could be done.

Testicular cancer is extremely rare (like 1% of the population) so he could brushed off the enlargement as caused by something else. I assume by doctor you mean a general practitioner and not a urologist.

 

its weird that cancer could make them shrink that much.

 

Unfortunately, many testicular cancer goes undetected but testicular exam should have been a part of every physical your brother did. If he did have a lump or felt it was worth talking about before the disease spread, then there are negligence on the doctor's part for not following a full workup. However, the issue with litigation is if the physician documented that he did a testicular exam and found nothing over several physical exam, there's not much you can do. The increase in Ca is always suspicious for malignancy but usually it is due to paraneoplastic syndrome and progression of the disease. I am sorry that it was just recently discovered, but the cure rate for testicular cancer even that spread is pretty good with chemotherapy. My advice is find a different family medicine physician, some of the older doctors are not as well versed anymore and doesn't keep up with the literature.

 

was he an hmo doctor?

 

If every Doctor that has made a mistake had to stop practicing medicine, there would be no Doctors.

 

I think you may be barred from filing a medical malpractice lawsuit after 10 years because of the statute of limitations. When did your brother get the second opinion?