Physician, practice found liable for misreading CT scan, missing lung cancer diagnosis
A doctor in Alabama has recently been found guilty of failing to diagnose lung cancer from ignoring suspicious abnormalities in two CT scans and charged with a $3 million verdict.
Manuel Carcelen and Pulmonary Medicine Associates were found by a court to have ignored such abnormalities in the CT scans noted by the patient's radiologist, according to a release from Hare, Wynn, Newell & Newton.
Vernon B. Williams had undergone two CT scans of his chest and lungs because of a hospitalization for pneumonia in February 2008. William's radiologist considered lung cancer to be a possibility after analyzing William's second CT scan. However, Carcelen discharged him from further treatment and never disclosed that radiologists deemed his CT scan as abnormal and suspicious of cancer. Almost three years later, in 2010, Williams had a third CT scan revealing metastatic lung cancer and passed away seven months later.
A recent graduate from Dominican University (IL) with a bachelor’s in journalism, Melissa joined TriMed’s Chicago team in 2017 covering all aspects of health imaging. She’s a fan of singing and playing guitar, elephants, a good cup of tea, and her golden retriever Cooper.