Misdiagnosis
There is a huge opportunity to put knowledge and tools into the hands of clinicians to help them make a better or more timely and accurate diagnosis - Janet Corrigan
image by: National Cancer Institute
HWN Suggests
The Key to Reducing Doctors’ Misdiagnoses
A flood of new initiatives by researchers, physicians, health-care systems, nonprofits and malpractice insurers is yielding new insights and approaches. These include sophisticated computer programs, some that use artificial intelligence to help analyze and diagnose tough cases, and others that scan records for errors such as missed test results and appointments. Advanced technologies aren’t just bringing the processing power of big data and machine learning to bear. They are also allowing more doctors to share their knowledge—including lessons they’ve learned from their own diagnostic mistakes.
Misdiagnoses are a leading cause of medical…
Featured
How Much Are We Over-Diagnosing Cancer?
Medical experts now agree that as a result of aggressive screening programs, we have an epidemic of cancer overdiagnosis in the United States. With mammograms finding tiny cancers and PSA tests discovering unpalpable prostate cancers, we are now unearthing some cancers too early for our own good.
Most Americans Will Be Misdiagnosed at Least Once
Most people in the U.S. will experience at least one misdiagnosis or delayed diagnosis in their lifetimes, according to a new report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM). Such mistakes—called diagnostic errors by physicians—could be as simple as failing to forward the results of a medical test showing that a patient recovered from a recent illness.
Articles of Interest
Anatomy of a Misdiagnosis
For decades, shaken baby syndrome has been, in essence, a medical diagnosis of murder. But going forward, prosecutors, judges and juries should exercise greater skepticism. The triad of symptoms alone cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that an infant has been fatally shaken.
I Was Misdiagnosed: What Happens When Your Doctor Gets It Wrong
We talked to three different people, living with three different health conditions, about how a misdiagnosis changed their life. Here are their stories...
Misdiagnosis Is A Lot More Common Than You Might Think
The researchers noted that the study likely did not capture all types of diagnosis errors. For example, the medical records the researchers reviewed likely failed to document some errors. This means that the true rate of misdiagnoses could be higher, the researchers said.
Misdiagnosis is more common than drug errors or wrong-site surgery
Misdiagnosis “happens all the time,” said David Newman-Toker, who studies diagnostic errors and helped organize the recent international conference. “This is an enormous problem, the hidden part of the iceberg of medical errors that dwarfs” other kinds of mistakes, said Newman-Toker, an associate professor of neurology and otolaryngology at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
The Battle Against Misdiagnosis
Each year an estimated 5% are misdiagnosed based on currently available evidence. Still, after years of taking a back seat to problems such as medication and treatment errors, misdiagnosis is getting attention.
The Biggest Mistake Doctors Make
"Diagnostic error is probably the biggest patient-safety issue we face in health care, and it is finally getting on the radar of the patient quality and safety movement," says Mark Graber, a longtime Veterans Administration physician and a fellow at the nonprofit research group RTI International.
The PTSD Trap: Our Overdiagnosis of PTSD In Vets Is Enough To Make You Sick
This quest to scale back the definition of PTSD and its application stands to affect the expenditure of billions of dollars, the diagnostic framework of psychiatry, the effectiveness of a huge treatment and disability infrastructure, and, most important, the mental health and future lives of hundreds of thousands of U.S. combat veterans and other PTSD patients.
Why Doctors Still Misunderstand Heart Disease in Women
But even with the increasing attention paid to heart disease in women over the past couple decades, it could still take some time to erase centuries of bias—not only within the medical community, but among women themselves.
Why It’s So Easy for Doctors to Misdiagnose Kids
Getting it right is that much harder when patients don’t know the words to describe what they’re feeling.
Resources
10 Commonly Misdiagnosed Conditions
The chance of getting a medical misdiagnosis could be greater than you think. A recent study found that diagnostic errors may affect as many as 12 million – or one out of every 20 – American adults. Half of those errors are potentially harmful, according to the study’s authors.
12 Million Americans Misdiagnosed Every Year, New Study Shows
Synthesizing the results of three separate studies, researchers from Houston Veterans Affairs Medical Center and Baylor College of Medicine calculate that 12 million Americans a year, or more than 5 percent of all patients, are misdiagnosed as a result of doctors failing to follow up on “red flags” for cancer and other serious illness.
5 Things A Serious Misdiagnosis Taught Me About Myself
Nearly five years after finding out the truth about my illness, I still remain drug-free and totally fine. Sometimes it seems like all that I went through was for nothing — but the biggest misdiagnosis of my young life taught me some fundamental things about myself.
