Damages for Radiology Malpractice

Radiologists are often among the first providers to have an opportunity to properly diagnose a patient’s illness or other internal injury. Radiologists evaluate studies in relation to brain tumors and injuries, lunch cancer, breast cancer, warning signs of stroke, abdominal injuries, infections, inflammations, and more. The work of radiologists often goes into diagnosing and treating conditions in a fetus or mother that could lead to birth injuries. The seasoned Syracuse medical malpractice lawyers of DeFrancisco & Falgiatano Personal Injury Attorneys have more than three decades of experience winning damages for clients who have been injured through the negligence of others.

Errors by radiologists can result in a failure to diagnose or treat serious conditions such as cancer. Many lawsuits are brought because a radiologist failed to let a patient know about test results. However, some mistakes involve a radiologist missing an abnormality, making a perception area, or misinterpreting tests and studies. When a radiologist departs from the professional standard of care owed by reasonably competent radiologists in the Syracuse area and around Upstate New York, such that a patient experiences injuries, he or she may be held accountable for damages arising out of those injuries. Radiological errors may result in failure to diagnose, late diagnosis resulting in delayed care, and misdiagnosis, and these, in turn can result in a patient suffering brain damage, heart attack, stroke, or organ failures.

When our medical malpractice lawyers are able to establish liability, we can recover compensatory damages for your losses. These may be both economic and noneconomic damages; in most cases, these damages must be proven.

Economic damages we may be able to recover include lost wages, medical bills, out-of-pocket costs, and replacement services. For example, if you are an accountant whose breast cancer goes undiagnosed due to a radiologist’s failure to spot an abnormality in your mammogram such that the cancer spreads and you require more expensive and painful treatments, you may find yourself unable to work for a period of time as you rack up medical bills; these could be recovered in a successful radiology malpractice suit.

Noneconomic damages may include pain and suffering, loss of consortium, mental anguish, and loss of enjoyment of life. Personal qualities of a plaintiff can significantly impact the noneconomic damages that are available. Our lawyers take care to fully explore the losses that clients experienced to present the full range of intangible losses to the jury. If, for example, a radiologist failed to catch a heart abnormality related to your congestive heart failure, and because you were not treated in a timely fashion, you could no longer participate in recreational sports as you used to do or engage in intimacy with your spouse, the jury would try to quantify these losses and award them as loss of enjoyment and loss of consortium damages.

If your loved one died as a result of radiology malpractice, such as misinterpretation of test results or a failure to communicate results that would have led to proper treatment, you may be able to pursue damages in a wrongful death lawsuit. Wrongful death lawsuits are those caused by wrongful acts, neglect, or default of the sort that the decedent could have pursued with a personal injury or medical malpractice lawsuit had she survived.

If we can establish liability in a wrongful death lawsuit, we may be able to recover compensatory damages including funeral and burial expenses, financial support the decedent would have contributed to the family, reasonable health care expenses related to a decedent’s final injury or illness, reasonable health care expenses related to the deceased person's final injury or illness, the value of support and services a decedent would have given the family, lost inheritance, value of parental guidance and conscious pain and suffering experienced by the deceased. As a family member, you won’t be able to recover under New York law for your own pain and suffering or mental anguish as the result of losing a loved one to malpractice.

Many families do not have enough saved up in case of malpractice by a professional. If you or a loved one was harmed by radiology malpractice, it’s important to talk to a veteran Syracuse medical malpractice lawyer with a reputation for seeking and achieving best results at trial. For more than 35 years, DeFrancisco & Falgiatano Personal Injury Attorneys has represented patients and their families in Lowville, Rochester, Auburn, Watertown, Herkimer, Oswego, Wampsville, Canandaigua, Lyons, Ithaca, Cooperstown, Oneida, Utica, Binghamton, Buffalo, Albany, Elmira, and all of Upstate New York. For a free consultation, complete our online form or call us at 833-200-2000.