Cauda Equina Syndrome and Medical Negligence

To add....at present I am 2.5 years into my negligence case against my doctors. Three doctors in total mis diagnosed my CES but at this moment just one is being sued. Logistically, it makes sense to sue one rather than the three and the on the day that the third doctor mis diagnosed i was presenting all the red flag signals.

Up to now I have four independent expert witnesses who are acting on my behalf. I have been assessed by a neurosurgeon for examination and prognosis report...a consultant urologist for the same..and undergone extensive nerve testings.
I am now waiting to see a neurosurgeon who will carry out an assessment on me on behalf of the doctor.

I recall that initially an independent doctor looked at all my medical records to write a report establishing if the doctor failed in her duty of care responsibility. Once this had been established, the claim progressed to the next stage.

I am hoping that next year will be the final year of the claim...we are awaiting the doctor's reply....how ideal will it be if they accept responsibility! If she doesn't then it will go to court.

Some good questions and points Mark. I too wondered how rare CES is. I spoke to a doctor about this who was very honest and said that as general practitioners they may only meet one person with a spinal cord injury during their career and even more unlikely to meet someone with cauda equina syndrome. 

Medical practitioners are trained to look out for the red flag signals but my opinion is that they never expect to meet a patient with it so it seems all to often overlooked.

Il try to find some stats mark

Absolutely yes, there is too much pressure to move on to the next patient all to quickly. This isn't a good enough excuse or reason to fail in their duty of care to a patient and fail to act when someone visits with symptoms associated with CES.

They are medical practitioners and we put our welfare in their trust.

Three doctors in total all from the same practice ignored my symptoms after i visited all three on consecutive occasion during a 7 day period...with worsening CES symptoms...it really isn't acceptable.

In my case it wasn't even ignorance....and ignorance would not be an excuse either...but they even wrote in my records..'no evidence of cauda equina'...and at the last doctor visit i was presenting all the symptoms. I was in a wheelchair, unable to walk with b and b issues and numbness in the saddle area and legs...

They simply did not expect me to have it......

After my eventual operation, approx 2 weeks later i went back to the first doctor that i saw because i was getting swelling in my legs..one more than the other. She firstly apologised and then examined my legs.
She said that everything looks ok and she is 99% sure that i dont have a clot in my legs but said she would send me for a leg scan in light of what had happened to me with missing CES...

I went to the hospital the same day and they found 3 blood clots..one was travelling to my heart...if this doctor followed her 'instinct' i would have not been sent for the scan and i would have soon been dead....its disgraceful. :mad:

Thanks for keeping us updated Lαrα! It's not too long now until you know what's going to happen

Lαrα, lawsuits are extremely stressful and can mentally & physically take a toll on someone especially if it was unreasonable but in your situation, a doctor really has nothing to lose. They didn't suffer as a result of your injury, they've got plenty of money and insurance coverage. The only thing they may worry about is potentially increased insurance rates in the future so don't feel bad. I can guarantee you that "sick leave" they took was for other reasons

Just to echo what Lara said about the 2 aspects of a lawsuit. In the US it depends on state law. Here in Ohio it is much as Lara described in the initial post. I consulted 2 different medical malpractice attorneys, as I was misdiagnosed by the ER Dr. I saw (after telling him that it was suspected CES!) He told me flat out, "You don't have Cauda Equina Syndrome."

So both attorneys agreed that there was no doubt medical negligence involved. However, the 2nd point Lara made, "causation", well that was the deal breaker. Although I had a severe stenosis (herniation) and I did not get decompression surgery for 14 days after my injury, my recovery has been on the high end. Details are on my blog, but the short story is that I am back at work, have regained much of the feeling I lost (I was numb below L4/L5 level - all the way to the tip of my toes).

I still have bladder & bowel issues, tingling & numbness in feet (below ankles), nerve pain, lower leg spasms/cramps, leg weakness and saddle numbness, I am otherwise in good shape. So did the delay affect my outcome? Both attorneys felt that we had a no more than a 20% chance of winning over a jury. Given that the cost of such a lawsuit for those projected odds of winning, neither attorney would take my case - not financially feasible for them. While my life is permanently changed, there is no legal recourse for me because I busted my butt in rehab and in outpatient physical therapy to get better. I am pursuing disciplinary action through the health company that runs the ER I went to, but there is a tangled web of levels of sub-contracted doctors working there. Everyone is polite and sympathetic, but nothing is done. We shall see.

Hey cesdavid, I'm sorry to hear that they gave you such a low success rate for the case. There's definitely been clear negligence as Lαrα has mentioned!

I do hope you take this on further with a good outcome. Please keep us updated