Author presents a few pediatric cases concerned to legal questions, gave rise to a serious troubles, and emphasizes that the term "misdiagnosis in pediatric diseases" has some limitation to compare with other medical fields.
The most of pediatric diseases, especially in infectious diseases, manifest systemic symptoms and signs a few weeks later the onset. This is the difference between pediatric and adult´s patients.
In infectious diseases, same organism may cause inapparent or clinical symptoms of differing severity and extent in accordance with such host factors as age, sex, previous contact with the agent, allergy, nutritional status, and the like. And also clinical symptoms may progress rapidly, associate with critical complication in younger children.
For example, the "cold", most common disease in pediatric age group, may manifest only general symptoms, like as fever, coryza, cough and vomiting during a few hours and days of illness, however there is always some potentiality to occur lower respiratory infection and CNS involvement within a week of the illness.
Therefore, for judgement of correct or erroneous diagnosis in pediatric cases, First; When pediatrician had seen his patient, exactly what was the date of the illness,?, Second; Was interpreted correctly patient´s symtoms and signs when visited first time at his clinic? should be considered firstly.
|