Misdiagnosed Lyme Disease Can Lead to Years of Suffering

What is Lyme disease? Lyme disease begins with a bite from a “deer tick.” During the next 3 to 30 days, you may notice a bulls-eye shaped rash or flu-like symptoms. Untreated Lyme disease results in long-term symptoms such as joint pain, arthritis, heart block and neurological problems like meningitis or Bell’s palsy. Children may suffer from severe depression and/or anxiety.

Lyme disease is diagnosed through your symptoms and a blood test and the assessment of symptoms. The blood test looks for a bacteria called Borrelia which is the cause of the disease. However, a negative result can still miss 20-50% of patients, who are actually infected. Therefore proper diagnosis requires a combination of blood testing and clinical analysis.

What Happens If Your Lyme Disease is Misdiagnosed?

When there is a longer delay in Lyme disease treatment, it will take that much longer for the symptoms to disappear.

When a doctor fails to diagnose Lyme disease, the results can be devastating. Sometimes patients will be diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, fibromyalgia, Crohn’s disease, Early Alzheimer’s disease or nothing at all, instead. When this happens, patients can become wheelchair bound or in some cases even die, because their illness was not treated properly. This occurred in the case of David A. Geraghty. He was diagnosed with ALS, and when his wife questioned doctors and suggested that it might be Lyme disease, her idea was dismissed. Sadly, Geraghty died as a result.

In many cases, a false negative Lyme disease diagnosis, when finally corrected (often through a patient’s own research), has led to a full recovery. The lives of victims of misdiagnosis can be saved if the diagnosis is changed in time. Unfortunately, for those who do not receive a correct diagnosis, they can suffer through years of pain, confusion and depression.

Have You Been Wrongly Diagnosed?

If you or a loved one has experienced suffering due to a failure to properly diagnose Lyme disease, you may have the basis for a medical malpractice lawsuit. Contact us, at Lowenthal & Abrams for a free consultation with a caring and experienced attorney, today.