Sometimes, doctors or hospitals make mistakes, whether in Illinois or another jurisdiction. One man recently filed a complaint in Cook County Circuit Court against a doctor and St. Luke Medical Center. He also named his family doctor as an additional defendant with regard to alleged misdiagnoses of his medical issue.
On May 17, 2013, the man underwent a sacral cyst excision. He then spent just over a week in the medical center. In the following months, he had pain and drainage in the area where the surgery was performed. The pain radiated through both hips. The doctor prescribed medications to treat the infection and the pain.
The patient also had Type 2 diabetes, and it is alleged that the doctor who performed the surgery was aware of this condition. This apparently put him at greater risk of developing other problems, such as methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aereus. In Sept. 2013, the man discovered that he had indeed been diagnosed with this type of infection when he saw his family doctor and was told about it for the first time. From the time of the surgery until the following May, he was continuously treated by the doctors but not cured of the symptoms. He claims that he was never referred to a specialist for treatment and was not given the care that he required.
In this case, the patient is seeking damages greater than $150,000 and he has cited three separate counts of negligence regarding his care. He asserts that the initial misdiagnoses cased the problems that he encountered. A victim of misdiagnosis in Illinois can seek financial relief from those who failed to diagnose and treat them according to appropriate medical standards.
Source: cookcountyrecord.com, “Man sues over allegedly underestimated post-op infection“, Dan Harkins, Aug. 3, 2015