A heart attack misdiagnosis can be a fatal mistake by a doctor. For instance, a doctor may believe that the patient is just having an anxiety attack. Rather than treating them for the heart attack, the doctor sends them home and tells them to try to relax, drink water and get some rest. The patient goes home and then passes away from the heart attack.
This can happen to both men and women, but studies show that it is more likely to happen to women. The rate at which heart attacks are misdiagnosed is higher, so they face greater risks of this significant medical mistake. But why is it that women see this type of misdiagnosis so much more often?
They present different symptoms
There are a lot of potential reasons, but one of the main ones is that symptoms tend to be different between genders.
For example, women who are having heart attacks often talk about feeling lightheaded, dizzy or nauseous. They may complain about back pain or neck pain. They may mention feeling very fatigued and rundown, or just generally feeling sick.
Men, on the other hand, often talk about chest pain, arm pain and difficulty breathing. Chest pain is their top symptom. But if a doctor is just looking for chest pain to indicate a heart attack, a female patient may not mention it because that is not a symptom she is experiencing. The doctor’s assumption that all patients will have male symptoms leads to the misdiagnosis.
Have you been harmed due to a mistake made by a doctor, or have you lost a loved one? You may be entitled to compensation.