.. to think that a consultant should be able to spot a broken bone...

[anonymousbird]

.. on an x-ray?????
Have been forced to seek a second consultant's opinion (privately I hasten to add in light of time frame and a child in pain) to confirm that my son HAS a broken bone.

A consultant is supposed to be an "expert", and this smacks of malpractice at worst - the treatment for a broken bone being completely different from treating a bad sprain or bruise - thereby putting my son's recovery and future use of the affected body part at risk, and just damned lazy and inefficient at best not to spend long enough examining the x-rays. Oh, and this is after two A&E doctors have diagnosed a break, so he was actually overruling other professionals in reaching his opinion.

Is there any come back on this? He is dangerous in my view.

Is it a wrist bone?

Collar

Was the consultant a Radiologist?

some breaks can be particularly difficult to identify so I think YABU

I ask because wrists ofen need to be re X-rayed a week or 2 after the accident because they don't show up straight away.

Most fractures show up on X rays but not all so he could have examined it all summer long and still not have seen it.

It was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon.

But to actively overrule the diagnosis of the A&E orthopaedic doctor, you would have to be pretty damn certain, wouldn't you? They are paid to identify particularly difficult to identify breaks, that is why they are the experts and not me! A consultant is as expert as you get, surely, this guy deals with bones, broken bones, joints etc day in day out... I expect him to get it right.

I just think that him saying Gung-Ho "banish the sling, get it moving, he'll be fine in a few days" was just negligent when in fact the area needed to be rested, kept protected and not moving any more than necessary....

And, he didn't even undertake a physical examination of the affected area - if he had (as I now know) when we saw him 5 days after the accident, he would have clearly found the fracture just from feeling the area. My GP and today's consultant said that this alone, even without an X-ray gave a 100% certain diagnosis.

I think he is pretty shabby, personally.

YANBU - in light that your child sufferes..

but I had something similar a few years back. fell down the stairs and broke my foot. dr in a+e only saw one break (on the ankle) but I was quite sure that a middle bone was broken as well. that one only showed up on an x-ray in the fracture clinic a week later. apparently fresh breaks sometimes are barely visible, only later when the body starts to heal it is obvious.

But a consultant Orthopaedic surgeon is not a consultant Radiologist (who is actually trained and paid to identify breaks).

PVS, today's consultant saw it from the x-rays taken at A&E, and he pointed it out to me on the screen and I could see it too.

No major harm done, thankfully, as he has been at home with me all this time so I have been able to watch him, encourage him to take it easy, and remind him to take care. But if he had been at school, running around the playground "on doctor's orders that all ok", then he could have really done himself a lot of unnecessary hurt and discomfort.

Oh, I forgot to add that I only found out today, that the Radiologist also diagnosed No Break.

Today's consultant told me.

So he was X rayed, A&E Dr saw a fracture, refered him to fracture clinic, orthopod said no break without doing an examination even though its clear on the Xray?

He sounds drunk mad.

Well if the radiologist also said No Break then it obviously wasn't easy to spot...so YABU to be this angry at the consultant.

Ok, I'll be cross with them both - the Radiologist for not doing his job properly, and the Orthopaedic surgeon for taking the radiologists word for it, without checking carefully enough for himself and for not examining the patient, as it would have been obvious.

Today's consultant's word was actually "WOW" that famous medical term when he felt the fracture lump on the collar bone as it is quite pronounced. And his advice is, that in a young child, that lump starts to form quickly, certainly in the five days between event and fracture clinic check up, so it really should have been picked up then.

Grrr

I know how you feel anon. I fractured my spine in 2 places. A & E doc said no fractures. Consultant radiologist found 2 fractures.

No one bothered to inform me so I took no time off work etc. Thought I was being a big wuss because I was in agony.

It's quite common apparantly, I know of 2 other people it happened to.

YANBU. Hope your son feels better soon.

aged knees as to your experience, but also that this is not an uncommon occurrence! You must have been in agony and putting yourself at risk of worsening your injury/not making good recovery

Thanks for your concern, he is in fact feeling much better and is healing really well with no complications or anything other than a full recovery expected.

HOWEVER, he is only five and to think that he was told to "get back on the horse" (figuratively speaking) when that was absolutely the WRONG advice makes me but also a bit sad that he would have experienced more pain than he needed to if we had followed that advice and I didn't have a fabulous GP...

Should have been pretty easy to spot, yes.

...but not something to get too excercised about. It doesn't make a lot of difference in the long run, many people suffer injuries like this and never go anywhere near medical treatment and nothing drops off.