Wrong diagnoses can result in wrong medicines being prescribed and wrong ailments being treated. However, usually they don’t result in the loss of major organs.
Now a Colorado grandmother is experiencing the worst kind of misdiagnosis. 73-year old Linda Woolley went to her doctor after having abdominal pains. She never could have imagined what would happen next.
She was diagnosed with what doctors believed was kidney cancer. Woolley was immediately scheduled for surgery at the University of Colorado Hospital where doctors performed surgery and removed both of her kidneys.
When the post-operative biopsy was returned, it showed there was no cancer at all in her kidneys, nor anywhere else in her body. Doctors then realized their mistake. But now Linda has to sit through four hours of dialysis three times a week.
Needless to say, she is upset and angry at what has happened to her. “I feel like they owe me a kidney, that’s for sure,” Woolley says. She has now hired an attorney to explore the lawsuit she will most likely file against the physicians and hospital.
We can survive with just one kidney, but not without both. With no kidney, your body cannot filter the blood, and dialysis is required. In dialysis, the body is hooked up to an IV and a machine filters and cleans the blood.
Most patients can only survive through dialysis for around ten years. It is an arduous process, and Woolley, a grandmother is feeling that firsthand.
“My life was totally changed,” she says. “Dialysis is no picnic, no matter how used to it you get. It robs you of your life.”
While a lawsuit can never heal Linda Woolley, and it is certainly only cold comfort, it is her only recourse after this tragedy.
If you have legal questions about a possible misdiagnosis, please consult our Online Legal Directory to find an attorney in your area.