Failure to Diagnose Liver Cancer in Baltimore County

This is a failure to diagnose liver cancer lawsuit filed by a man in Baltimore County. It is the 90^th medical malpractice claim filed in Maryland in 2017, filed in Health Claims Arbitration on February 23, 2017. It is the first case in 2017 filed against GBMC.

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Plaintiff goes to the emergency room at Greater Baltimore Medical Center with abdominal pain. An ultrasound shows no evidence of gallstones. A CT scan her abdomen/pelvis is done. This reveals three lesions in her liver, not clearly identified cysts and not shown in a CT two years prior, or the ultrasound that was done that same day.

The next day the woman has a nuclear medicine hepatobiliary ductal scan done. She is also evaluated by defendants who suggest further workups. Plaintiff has a laparoscopic cholecystectomy done the following day and is then discharged from GBMC. When she is discharged, she has three lesions on her liver that need more workup.

Plaintiff follows up with the same doctors who, incredibly if the Complaint is accurate, do not discuss the three lesions. For the next three years, the woman is seen multiple times by defendant primary care physician, who also never discussed the lesions with her and did not refer her to a specialist.

The woman is found to have bilateral breast cancer, and she undergoes a full double mastectomy. Less than two months later, she is taken to the ER at St. Joseph's Medical Center. At the ER, she gets an abdominal scan. This reveals tumors in the plaintiff's liver.

She undergoes a needle aspiration biopsy of her liver at Mercy Hospital. This confirms that the tumors are cancerous. She files this claim, alleging that the failure to timely diagnose her liver cancer caused her to suffer physical injuries including unnecessary surgeries and treatments.

• Some of the care criticized in the complaint occurred between three and five years before the lawsuit is filed. There could be some statute of limitations issues if the doctors contend - which you have to think they would - that they told the plaintiff of the three lesions. But the plaintiff is going to argue the discovery rule and this is probably an issue that would go to the jury if the facts play out as the lawsuit suggests.
• Certainly, the question of what, if anything, her doctors told her about those lesions is going to be critical to the case.
• Plaintiff is going to need an oncologist to opine that her treatment would have very different if it had been diagnosed earlier.
• We do not get a great sense of where the plaintiff is right now in her treatment. Hopefully, her prognosis is great. But that is the great paradox in these cases: a good recovery is not good for your case.

• Baltimore County

• Greater Baltimore Medical Center
• A surgeon in Towson
• Finney, Trimble Surgical Associates, LLC
• 3 ER doctors at GBMC/Charles Emergency Physicians
• Charles Emergency Physicians, P.A. (the ER group at GBMC).
• A Timonium/Lutherville internist

• Greater Baltimore Medical Center
• St. Joseph's Medical Center
• Mercy Hospital

• Failure to notify and inform plaintiff that she had three liver lesions requiring further workup
• Misdiagnosing the plaintiff's abdominal pain
• Performing an unnecessary cholecystectomy surgical procedure
• Failure to timely diagnose and treat liver cancer
• Failure to refer plaintiff to a specialist

• Medical Negligence
• Loss of Consortium
• Lack of Informed Consent

• None at this time

If you suffered due to the negligence of a doctor, call Miller & Zois. We can help you get the compensation you deserve for the harm you have been endured. We have a long history of results in medical malpractice in Maryland, earning large verdicts and settlements. Call Miller & Zois today to speak to a medical negligence attorney who can help you at (800) 553-8082, or get a free online case review.

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