kind of an odd lawsuit situation

[L.W. Baxter]

so, a combat vet green beret got scanned for dive school, a cancerous tumor was missed....yahoo link to wa po story

the guy signed up to get killed. and he is still alive. now he wants 40 million because whoever read his chest scan didn't see a tumor?

apparently he has been offerred $650k, which is the armed forces legal limit for pain and suffering.

gotta think, if this guy deserves a settlement, then every casualty--dead, injured, suffering ptsd--of war deserves at least as much. hmm.

[Jim Bow]

Sorry Sgt. Scheiss Happens. There’s a difference between an honest mistake and a criminal act. $40,000,000? Reeks of greed to me.

[Breakaway]

If I went to the doctor and was scanned for a tumor and he missed it, I have to say I would at least consider legal action. What do all the docs say? Get check early. if we find it early your chances are better. This chap went and they missed it, delaying treatment.

Is that significant in this case? I suppose it all hinges on details, as ever. But if I am in the military and go to a military doctor why should I expect less?

Kevin

[bluedog225]

In real life, there’s not a lot of accountability in medicine. Most hospital goings on are privileged from disclosure on the theory that the hospital docs can get together and talk about it more freely and openly to improve the process if they know their deliberations or secret. In reality, people are people and making waves hurts relationships.

[L.W. Baxter]

If I went to the doctor and was scanned for a tumor and he missed it, I have to say I would at least consider legal action. What do all the docs say? Get check early. if we find it early your chances are better. This chap went and they missed it, delaying treatment.

Is that significant in this case? I suppose it all hinges on details, as ever. But if I am in the military and go to a military doctor why should I expect less?

Kevin

i don't know. you're in the military, seeing military doctors (officers) right?

why can't you sue the general who sends you on a fubar mission? why doesn't the widow of a war casualty get 20 million?

[L.W. Baxter]

how about if you are in a field hospital being operated on and the surgeon makes a "mistake".

we need tort reform in this country. the last thing we need is to extend our civil law litigiousness to the military.

[Ted Hoppe]

Medical negligence in court take a bunch to prove. Miltary docs will breeze through exams that have healthy folks gung ho and wanting to do that additional training which has implied health risks and death.

One could flip it around, the military could counter sue stating that this soldier who may have family histories of tumor growth, misrepresented himself and neglected to disclose his actual health records and due to his condition as he was unfit for service when he enlisted.

[Breakaway]

how about if you are in a field hospital being operated on and the surgeon makes a "mistake".

we need tort reform in this country. the last thing we need is to extend our civil law litigiousness to the military.

Well, I think there is a distinction between routine or non combat medical care, which happens to provided by a soldiers employer and combat or war zone injury.

Should a soldier be able to trust a fellow soldier doctor when seeking testing or whatever? I think the docs should be held the same standard as civilians in those cases.


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[Breakaway]

i don't know. you're in the military, seeing military doctors (officers) right?

why can't you sue the general who sends you on a fubar mission? why doesn't the widow of a war casualty get 20 million?

You signed up for that. Took an oath about it, even.

You did neither with regards to disavowing responsibility in non war or normal medical issues.

Kevin

Edit: To be clear, I am not in favor of frivolous lawsuits. But, if legal recourse would be available to a civilian in similar circumstances, then soldiers should be able to avail themselves as well


K
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[John Smith]

If I went to the doctor and was scanned for a tumor and he missed it, I have to say I would at least consider legal action. What do all the docs say? Get check early. if we find it early your chances are better. This chap went and they missed it, delaying treatment.

Is that significant in this case? I suppose it all hinges on details, as ever. But if I am in the military and go to a military doctor why should I expect less?

Kevin

My brother moved to North Carolina. Shortly after he moved, his dr did a routine chest x-ray. A year later another. Second one found fairly advanced cancer. He figured it must have shown something on the first x-ray, and pursued it. Turned out there was a distinct, easily seen, spot on his lung in the first x-ray. He went to a lawyer to sue, but was told doctors in N. Carolina cannot be sued. That was their answer to frivolous lawsuits.

Sadly, my brother died soon after, but there was a touch of irony in that he believed all suits filed against doctors by others were frivolous.

[Peerie Maa]

You signed up for that. Took an oath about it, even.

You did neither with regards to disavowing responsibility in non war or normal medical issues.

Kevin

Edit: To be clear, I am not in favor of frivolous lawsuits. But, if legal recourse would be available to a civilian in similar circumstances, then soldiers should be able to avail themselves as well


K
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This.
You join the armed forces with the expectation of being shot at or blown up..
Medical incompetence is never part of the contract.

[Nicholas Carey]

If you read the details, it certainly sounds like malpractice. He was shot in the left lung in 2004 serving with the Marine Corps in Iraq. He was assigned to dive school in 2017. That damage prompted the dive doctors to requires not just a chest X-Ray, but a CT scan. The CT scan he received showed indicators of cancer of lung canceer that the radiologist/pulmonologists interpreting it either ignored or simply failed to see — due to cognitive bias, perhaps? Not looking for lung cancer, so they didn't see it?

His subsequent coughing up blood should certainly have triggered a certain amount of concern by medicos and triggered a deeper dive (sorry!) into what was going on in his lungs.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/green-ber...184754520.html

In January 2017, he was selected to attend a combat dive school, which required a chest X-ray. He got one on Jan. 13, 2017, at Womack Army Medical Center at Fort Bragg. The results, he believed, were normal.

But one of the dive school doctors told Stayskal that - given the damage to his left lung in Iraq - he needed a more thorough evaluation of his chest. So, on Jan. 27, 2017, he underwent a CT scan at Womack.

"They said, 'We'll call you if there's anything to notify you about,'" Stayskal said. "And I didn't hear a word about it after."

He was cleared for dive school. But soon he found he could no longer run three miles without struggling. He failed a test in which his hands and feet were tied in the water because he couldn't seem to breathe. He was wheezing. Then, he started coughing up blood.

About five months later, he was rushed to Womack's emergency room. Another X-ray was taken and pneumonia was raised as a possibility. He said one doctor, though, told him that he'd rechecked his CT scan from January and thought there was "something" that needed further investigation. He was told to see a pulmonologist.

By June 2017, as he waited to get an appointment with a military lung doctor, he kept coughing up more blood. Perhaps, he thought, the symptoms were linked to lead levels at a base gun range. Maybe he had severe bronchitis or pneumonia.

"I felt like I was being waterboarded," he said. "There were times I would carry a cup around because I was spitting up blood so much."

He got permission to go to a civilian pulmonologist who could see him faster, he said. In late June of that year, he got a chest scan and a biopsy at the civilian hospital. The diagnosis: advanced lung cancer.

At one point, he said, his new civilian doctor asked him, "Why didn't you come in earlier?"

"I said, 'What are you talking about?' He was like, 'Your scan in January says you had something that points to cancer,'" Stayskal recalled. "We were like, 'Are you kidding me?'"

- - -

New York oncologist Richard Hirschman wrote in his report that Stayskal's mass would have been diagnosed as Stage 1 if it had been caught in January 2017, and he "would have had approximately an 81% chance of a 5-year survival rate which is almost the same thing as cured."

[David W Pratt]

I would suspect the screening X-ray was intended only to rule out specific deselectors for the duty, not as a diagnostic fishing expedition.

[Nicholas Carey]

I would suspect the screening X-ray was intended only to rule out specific deselectors for the duty, not as a diagnostic fishing expedition.

But the CT scan had following that had something that was either called out in the radiologist's report, or was obvious to the civilian doctor reviewing his medical records:

"At one point, he said, his new civilian doctor asked him, "Why didn't you come in earlier?"

"I said, 'What are you talking about?' He was like, 'Your scan in January says you had something that points to cancer,'" Stayskal recalled. "We were like, 'Are you kidding me?'"

[Jimmy W]

how about if you are in a field hospital being operated on and the surgeon makes a "mistake".

we need tort reform in this country. the last thing we need is to extend our civil law litigiousness to the military.

The law does not include battalion aid stations or other medical treatment locations deployed in an area of armed conflict.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-...bill/2422/text

[L.W. Baxter]

You signed up for that. Took an oath about it, even.

You did neither with regards to disavowing responsibility in non war or normal medical issues....

This.
You join the armed forces with the expectation of being shot at or blown up..
Medical incompetence is never part of the contract.

actually, until the law was passed in 2019, you did sign up to be uncle sam's property.

and you are still uncle sam's property except for this odd little exception, by which you can sue the armed forces for the actions of a fellow soldier...but only if it has to do with your medical treatment.

i don't think that it should matter if the mistake meets the criteria of "malpractice" according to our civil law. that law is for civilians and civilian relationships. the military and soldiers have a necessarily different relationship.

it doesn't strike you as odd that a soldier can potentially be awarded tens of millions of dollars for a mistake made in medical diagnosis...but the soldier who loses life and limb cannot sue for a mistake made in the command of his life?

[bluedog225]

Much tort reform was given in return for the promise of better self regulation. Hasn’t happened.

Try to get a copy of your imaging in a format you can use. I’ve failed many times.

Once they simply gave me a printout. The person who did that got in trouble.