Skin cancer is one of the most treatable cancers when caught early but it’s also one that’s frequently missed. When it comes to a delayed or missed skin cancer diagnosis, the failure usually happens at one of two points: before a biopsy is ever done, or after the sample has already been sent to a lab. Sometimes both failures happen in the same case.
Failure to Recognize a Suspicious Spot
The first and most basic failure point happens during the physical exam. A doctor examines a mole, spot, or lesion on the skin and doesn’t recognize it as something that could potentially be cancerous. If that recognition never happens the doctor never takes the next step of recommending a biopsy (removing part of the skin and sending it to a lab for testing).
This means the diagnostic process stops before it even really begins. No biopsy means no lab test, and no lab test means the cancer has no opportunity to be caught at that visit. If the spot is in fact cancerous, it’s left to grow and potentially spread until it’s caught at a later, more advanced stage.
Errors in the Lab
The second failure point happens after a biopsy has already been done correctly. In these cases, part of the skin is removed and sent to a laboratory as it should be, but the error happens on the lab’s end. This can happen in one of two ways:
- The wrong test is performed on the tissue sample, meaning the lab doesn’t run the testing needed to properly identify cancerous cells.
- The correct test is performed, but it’s interpreted incorrectly – the lab reads the results and reports that there’s no cancer present, when in fact there is.
Either way, the result is the same: the patient and their doctor are told the biopsy came back clear, when the tissue was actually cancerous. That false negative can lead to a significant delay before the cancer is eventually caught, often once it has progressed further.
Why This Matters
Skin cancer can be highly treatable when caught early but outcomes can change significantly once it progresses. Whether the failure happens because a doctor didn’t recognize a suspicious spot in the first place, or because a lab made an error in testing or interpreting a biopsy, the effect on the patient can be the same: a missed window for early treatment.
If you were told a mole or skin lesion wasn’t cancerous and later received a skin cancer diagnosis, it may be worth having your medical records and biopsy results reviewed by an attorney experienced in these cases.
To learn more about Marciano Legal and our cancer misdiagnosis attorneys, please feel free to contact us online. You can also dial (215) 515-7743 if you need legal help for a claim of your own in Pennsylvania.
