Medical malpractice settlement. A 55 year old man went to an emergency room, had a chest x-ray done. The emergency room physician misread the chest x-ray, told our client it was negative. The next day, the hospital had a radiologist re-read the x-ray films. He correctly found a 2-3 cm mass legion on the lung, but failed to check the x-ray for a discrepancy between his reading and the emergency room physician's reading, in violation of hospital policy. The family doctor got the results shortly thereafter and also failed to communicate the results to our client. Our client went about 12 months without knowing that he had lung cancer. At the time the mistakes occurred, he was stage IA with a 70 percent five year survival rate. By the time he was finally diagnosed 13 months later, he was stage IV and terminal. Our client died two years later.

Our firm, on behalf of the surviving family, sued the emergency room physician, the family doctor, the radiologist and the hospital where the chest x-ray took place. After extensive litigation, the case settled for $2,275,000, ensuring that his surviving spouse would be able to take care of herself for the rest of her life.