Medical Negligence?

[tellison]

Hi All,

 

Everyone I tell my story to is telling me to seek legal advice and look to make a claim for what has happened to me.

 

In November last year I damaged my knee and immediately went to the local community hospital who referred me to A and E at the bigger hospital.

 

The doctor greeted me and went over my X-RAY which showed no signs of bone breakages or clear damage. He then did a few other tests asking myself to move in different places and after the normal ligament tests he then said to me 'he hopes its not meniscus damage and then proceeded to get another member off staff, my guess for a second opinion.

 

He was introduced as a 'specialist' and was very rude and abrupt. He then put me in significant pain, by far the worst feeling I have ever experienced. He then raised his voice numerous times at me commanding me to RELAX my leg which was PHYSICALLY and mentally impossible, he never even said he was about to put me in pain.

 

I had to push him off away due to the pain he caused myself. He then walked off and muttered a 'diagnosis' of bruised and that it will heal within a week or so.

 

 

 

Baring in mind I could NOT straighten my leg, it had locked. I then rang my GP on Monday as a emergency appointment who did some tests (similar to the original doctor) and then came to the conclusion that I have done some serious damage to my knee, he then referred me to a specialist (a real one) on emergency admission who performed tests that again put me in 0 pain.

 

He came to the conclusion that I HAVE meniscus damage and a 'urgent' MRI was required. Within 2 weeks I have had a operation to repair the damage which was initially missed....

 

My issues are :-

 

1. The amount of pain I was put in (no other doctor did the same) and I have never felt ANYTHING like it (broken bones and obviously done severe damage to my knee)

2. The diagnosis - If the original doctor stuck with his thought of meniscus damage I would of potentially had a MRI that evening.

3. The anxiety and stress caused from the doctor, I have had nightmares about him (sounds stupid but its true)

 

Do you think I should take this further? I keep being urged to do so, even by a medical professional. But feel I will just get it thrown back in my face.

 

Thank's for any advice.

[silverfox1961]

Hi and welcome to CAG

 

I'm no expert but my initial gut feeling is that all you are likely to get is an apology.

 

1 It seems the damage was already done when you damaged your knee. Trying to find out whether the doctors actions made it worse will be difficult.

 

2 Based on the original doctors assumptions this may have led to an MRI, the evidence firstly seen may not have been enough to confirm. While it is no use to you MRIs are very expensive and doctors will only use them where they absolutely needed. It may even be that even if the 'specialist' hadn't manipulated your knee, the damage and pain may have manifested itself over the next couple of days.

 

3 Have you spoken to your GP about this? Counselling may help but to be frank, time is a better healer.

 

I would suggest raising this with the hospital first (via PALS if you choose) and see where that gets you. If you go with an ambulance chaser, expect to lose quite a lot as well.

 

Sorry if that is not what you want to hear and as I say, I'm no expert but that is my honest opinion.

[tellison]

Hi silverfox,

 

Your views are pretty much the same as mine. Thank you. Any other advice is welcome!

[BazzaS]

I (too) agree.

 

I suspect you can distill this into 2 issues :

1) your feelings about the behaviour of the initial 'specialist'

2) did you suffer any harm by the MRI 'delay'?

 

Re: 2) first. MRI's need to be life changing / life threatening to be performed urgently. I can't see how you would have had one "that evening". So, you won't get far complaining that the attitude of the initial specialist caused you not to get an MRI that evening .....

 

1) : If no harm resulted, any claim for negligence would fail, so you could go down the PALS route rather than the 'legal claim' route.

expect to get (at most) an apology.

[fletch70]

Again , no expert here but I doubt very much if there is anything to gain financially . Something to be aware of is that sometimes injuries , or the extent of them, only become apparent several hours/days/weeks after the initial trauma