Should My Doctor Have Known that I Had Cancer?

What Types of Errors Can be Made by Doctors?

• Delays in referring you for further investigation of certain symptoms
• Misdiagnosis in your condition and the incorrect treatment provided
• An administrative error, for example, a failure to communicate and action test results
• A failure to correctly report on the results of scans and tests which are performed
• One or more errors which have occurred in the treatment of your cancer. However, it may be the case that those errors haven’t actually affected the treatment you would have received or your long-term outcome.

If you want to make a medical negligence claim, our expert Medical Negligence Solicitors can assess your claim and obtain the necessary evidence to determine whether a claim for compensation can be made.

Each person's circumstances will be different. In assessing your claim, your Medical Negligence Solicitor will need to consider your medical records, past medical history, the symptoms you were displaying and how many times you were visiting your doctor.

For more information see GP / Doctor Negligence Claims.

The Duty of Care

Health professionals owe you a duty of care to provide treatment to you which meets a certain reasonable standard. In the UK, there are nationally recognised guidelines that each health professional should follow which are related to their specific speciality.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines are one such set of guidelines which all health professionals are expected to take account of when exercising their clinical judgment. These set out recommendations which should be followed to recognise and appropriately refer a patient for further investigation and treatment dependent on the site of the suspected cancer.

If it can be shown that a health professional provided treatment which fell below the acceptable reasonable standard of care, which can include a failure to follow NICE or any other guidelines for their specific speciality, without a justifiable reason, they may be found to be negligent in the care that they provided to you.