The Washington Post wrote an article Monday underscoring fact that is well-known to lawyers handling malpractice cases in Maryland: doctors struggle to accurately read tests that determine medical conditions. Unfortunately for patients, this can have serious long-term consequences.
Most of these errors do not lead to malpractice cases because they show false positives. Sometimes these are malpractice cases because the unnecessary test is the harm — we tried that very case in Baltimore County last year and our client received a $1.45 million verdict.
Below are a few examples that I think really highlight the consequences of this problem. Each of these following examples and studies highlights the need for us to find a path to help doctors to improve their ability to assess tests more accurately.