Sixty Four Year Old Patient With Metastatic Colon Cancer Even Though Physician Knew Of Symptoms For Years by Joseph Hernandez

Sixty Four Year Old Patient With Metastatic Colon Cancer Even Though Physician Knew Of Symptoms For Years
by: Joseph Hernandez

Colon cancers on occasion bleed. Occasionally, the blood might be visible in the stool. When the cancer is close to the rectum, the blood may even surface as bright red. Regardless of whether the blood is not visible, it may nevertheless be possible to discover that the person is bleeding in other ways. As an example, the loss of blood might manifest as anemia. Blood tests might uncover internal loss of blood that may be from a tumor in the colon. The key blood test results to evaluate are the hemoglobin, hematocrit, and Mean Corpuscular Volume (MCV) levels. Low levels might reveal blood loss and iron deficiency anemia. If someone has levels that are low for these tests doctors commonly concur that there ought to be follow up to find out the explanation for the blood loss, including the chance of cancer of the colon.

Look at the case of a 64 year old man whose blood tests revealed all of the above. The next year, the person's blood work revealed a deterioration of the patient’s problem. Also, the man’s stools were found to contain blood. Yet, doing no additional testing, the individual's physician added a diagnosis of hemorrhoids into the man’s chart. Moreover, the man's PSA level (a test that is used to screen males for prostate cancer) was a 10.3 (a level above a 4.0 is normally regarded as high and suggestive of possible prostate cancer). The doctor made no mention in the person's chart to indicate an examination of the prostate. The doctor did not relay to the person about the high PSA levels and failed to refer the person to a specialist.

Around two years after the person was seen by a different physician. Because of the individual's age this doctor had him undergo a barium enema. The result: a diagnosis of advanced colon cancer. The person died of metastatic colon cancer not even 3 years subsequent to his diagnosis. The patient's family pursued a lawsuit against the doctor who ignored the patient’s abnormally low blood test results and dismissed the existence of blood in the man’s stool. The law firm that represented the family reported a settlement in the amount of $1,250,000

Blood tests are done for a reason. Abnormal test results are indicators that there may be something wrong, possibly dangerously wrong with the individual and require follow up. Sometimes follow up includes repeating the blood test within a short period of time to see whether the levels improve. Yet if the levels deviate sufficiently from normal levels or continue to worsen, doctors typically recognize that this raises the need to order proper supplemental tests to find out the explanation for those levels. Doctors also commonly acknowledge that blood in the stool of an adult individual mandates fast attention to rule out colon cancer as the cause. A colonoscopy is most frequently used to look at the entire colon and either locate or exclude the presence of any tumors. This doctor failed to do any of this.

About The Author

Joseph Hernandez is an Attorney accepting medical malpractice cases and wrongful death cases. You can learn more about cases involving colon cancer and other cancer matters including prostate cancer by visiting the website

The author invites you to visit:
http://www.medical-negligence-law.com