If you thought a GP had missed your cancer would you do anything about it?

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I've just been diagnosed with cancer and apparently have a 7cm tumour in my chest. My main symptom is chest pain, which I went to the GP about in 2016. She did a blood test, which found I was anaemic, and an ECG which wasn't normal but which she said was probably because my large chest was making it difficult for the sensors to get a reading. At the appointment to discuss the results, I distinctly remember her saying 'I don't know what's causing your chest pain'. I chalked it up to being fat/unhealthy/a stressed out mum and have lived with the pain ever since. It's got steadily worse to the point I couldn't stand it any more and went back to the GP a couple of weeks ago. He ordered blood tests, X-ray, then CT scan and overall it looks like I now have pretty advanced cancer. I honestly don't know if it's realistic that I've been living with this for 7 years but I understand that lymphoma can be very slow growing for a long time and then suddenly ramp up. It's a question I'll ask the consultant when I get an appointment (I'm only at early diagnostic stage so far).
I don't have access to my medical records from 2016 and need to figure out to get them, because I'd like to know if the blood tests at the time should have indicated anything more serious or if the GP should have followed up any further. But maybe I just need to let it go? What would you do? The GP in question has since retired and this is not necessarily about making a complaint - definitely not about compensation - more just about me wanting to know.

Sorry you’re going through this. I think it is really important that people complain or take legal action when necessary. This is the only way things get changed or improved. The only way standards are raised and followed.

This happened to my sister. She was bleeding all the time and had a bloated belly - GP said the bloating was due to a vitamin B deficiency and they couldn't do tests to find out about the bleeding because... she was bleeding. Eventually she was diagnosed with endometrial cancer, which they'd said it couldn't possibly be because she was under 40. She died a few weeks after her 41st birthday.

I have an autoimmune condition which went undiagnosed for three years. In fairness it's rare and the symptoms are a bit weird.

That said, I went the the GP six times in the year that I finally got diagnosed. And I pushed and pushed for tests and to be taken seriously.

I don't think you can blame the GP of you literally went in 2016 and then again 7 years later? The issue in 2016 might have been nothing to do with the cancer and even if it was, it doesn't sound like you followed up yourself. I'm sorry this has happened to you though, and hope you are well soon and treatment goes ok.

The OP has NOT been back to the doctors for 7 YEARS

so describing stories where someone fought hard for months / years and endured backwards and forwards to their surgery and numerous tests… is NOT the same. Not even close.

It happened to a friend who'd repeatedly gone to the GP and they kept saying it was IBS. She even went into hospital and they diagnosed pancreatitis, which the GPs again put down to IBS. From diagnosis of pancreatic cancer when admitted again to hospital by calling an emergency ambulance a second time, nothing to do with the GP, she lived a year.
The GPs apologised. That's it.
I guess it depends what outcome you're looking for.

@Throwncrumbs 'it’s just one of those things'. Those are literally the exact words my GP said to me after my fourth month long bout of diarrhoea. Then I saw a different GP at the practice and was immediately sent for tests and diagnosed with Crohn's Disease within two weeks.

It shouldn't be such a fight to be heard.

My Aunt was repeatedly fobbed off. Over and over. Then was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer, and six weeks later she was dead. I can't begin to detail the contempt I feel for her GP.

I'm so sorry for your diagnosis. Sadly the average person with blood cancer goes the GP over 3 times before they are referred and a high number are actually diagnosed in a&e.

Blood Cancer UK have nurses you can speak to, lots of online information and lots of other resources to help support you. Sending you lots of strength

I am pursuing it because DH is now dead from his cancer, I can't change things for him but I can change things moving forward. I hope that if, one day in the future, someone presents with DH's symptoms they won't be fobbed off like he was and that way their prognosis might be better.

Surely if you had scans etc done then it wouldn’t have been the GPS fault as it’s a completely different department.

Someone else would have scanned you, looked at the images and possibly sent them to your GP too but there would have been at least 1 other person involved which didn’t pick it up either.

You were tested and nothing was found. There is no blame here.

If you kept going to the GP and he kept refusing to send you for tests then it’s different but he didn’t.

I know that you are angry but it’s no one’s fault and blaming someone isn’t going to help or make it go away.

GP do seem to expect persistence - which is pain as getting in front of one or even nurse practitioners can feel like a huge battle on it's own - never mind fear of being dismissed once there.

I once did 4 appointment for one of the kids - fobbed off every time - fifth time was feeling fragile and DH was around - sent him - came back immediately with a diagnosis and prescription and matter was sorted - coincidence or fifth time a charm or it being Dad not Mum - no clue but have in emergencies when one of us needed to stay home with younger kids sent him with injured child due to worries I'd get dismissed more easily.

If a mistake has been made then, as a minimum, all concerned need to learn from it to avoid repetition. And, frankly, if it has in my view OP should be looking into a clinical negligence claim, that is why doctors have insurance.

Sorry I’ve just seen that you hadn’t been to the doctors in years.

He can’t diagnose you or send you for tests if you don’t make an appointment.

I would hope that lessons could be learnt and processes improved.

At work if we discover we made a mistake we try to track down the root cause.

Q1. How many times did you seek medical advice during the period 2016 to your diagnosis in summer 2023 regarding this matter?

OP. Not once

Q2. Come again?

The first thing I was asked when I went for an uLyra sound on a breast lump was ‘can you show me where you think this lump is’. How they were looking in the wrong area is very odd.

I was diagnosed with cancer at a young age, with a type of cancer that very rarely affected someone as young as me.

I went to the doctor several times in year before I was diagnosed and ended up in A&E a couple of times too. I don’t blame any of them for missing it.

Yes the treatment would have been easier if I was diagnosed sooner, and it wouldn’t have left me with life long issues, but the reality is I was a rare case, so despite having symptoms, there was no reason for them to be looking for cancer. Unfortunately there aren’t routine tests that diagnose cancer so sometimes it’s a process of elimination until the cancer is found. It sucks, but that’s the reality of it.

So you don't want people to learn from mistakes and doctors to Keep misdiagnosing people.

And it happened to my mum the GP was that arrogant that said it wasn't possible for my mum to have cancer in the area after a hysterectomy, where a quick Google shows it is entirely possible.

These arent minor mistakes these mistake cost life's and half the time due to arrogant/incompetent GPs.

@Jazzappledelish well yes that is different then. They can't diagnose something they can't see

Speaking as a GP I'd suggest asking for your blood results from 2016 and if a GP could go through them with you.

I suspect it is unlikely that there will have been anything in those results to predict what is happening now unless, most lymphomas would have progressed to cause systemic symptoms much sooner than 7 years. But if you have niggling doubts it would be best to get them addressed and hopefully restore your faith in your practice for the future, you could also take the results with you to your consultant appointment.

Sorry to hear what you are going through at the moment and that the rest of your diagnostics and treatment goes well. I'm currently being treated for a haematological cancer (which ironically I missed myself for longer than I should have done) and I know it can be a tough process.

No, what would be the point? People are human, mistakes can be made and your energy would be better focused on the present rather than the past.

Because health outcomes are much worse for women than men because of shit like this. It may be unusual for this particular GP, but as a group, all GPs and all doctors are less likely to pick up or take seriously problems presented by women. Women of colour have even worse outcomes. Until doctors are forced to look at their decision making, that wont improve.

My mum (80) has had this happen recently. Went to the Doctors with a lump in her breast in October last year and thought she needed to be referred as there is history in the family.

GP simply dismissed it and said, don't be ridiculous, it's an abscess and gave her antibiotics. After multiple return visits, she demanded to be referred. She was diagnosed with breast cancer 5 months after the first visit to the GP, has just had major surgery and now has further treatment to go through. She was told if she had been referred originally, she would have not required such a large operation, if one at all.

The GP (I have the same one), is and always will be an arrogant arsehole who has basically got away with it.

I find what OP wrote ambiguous about whether she asked the GP about her chest pain in the period 2016-2023.

I have these views:

Shit happens
Not all shit is preventable
When OP went, her complaint was taken seriously enough to get an ECG & blood test
There were NO RED Flags saying cancer from those tests
GPs shouldn't go fishing for maybe maybe conditions
over-investigation, over-diagnosis, over-treatment: these are all harmful TO PATIENTS; it is right to try to avoid them
Rare things can be very difficult to diagnose

if OP got her records or made a complaint, she still wouldn't know for sure that she had the start of her cancer in 2016.

I'm sorry to learn about your cancer, OP. What treatment are you being offered now?

So sorry for what you going through. I hope you are able to fight this.

My experience is if you believe something isn’t right you have to keep going back, demand more tests, do research of the worse possible outcome for your symptoms and then persist until you have the all clear.