Can I Claim for an Undiagnosed Scaphoid Fracture?

A scaphoid fracture is the fracturing of the small bone on the thumb side of your wrists.

It most often occurs from falling hands-first onto a hard surface, and is the most common type of wrist fracture.

Often this type of fracture is overlooked because it feels like a sprained wrist rather than a broken bone.

There is usually only a little bit of swelling, but depending on how you fall the amount of pain you feel varies.

The two most common symptoms of a scaphoid fracture are tenderness directly over the bone and pain when moving your thumb or gripping things.

Scaphoid fractures are frequently not spotted at A&E  departments across the UK, and need to be dealt whilst there remains good blood supply to the site.

If mistaken for a sprain, an undiagnosed scaphoid fracture can lead to long-term complications.

Undiagnosed Scaphoid Fracture Symptoms

Undiagnosed scaphoid fracture symptoms include:

• Your bone failing to heal, which is called a ‘simple nonunion’
• The development of avascular necrosis, where the lower half of the fractured bone loses its blood supply and dies
• Degenerative arthritis, when joint cartilage and underlying bone begin to deteriorate
• Surgery to attempt to fix the above

Of course, none of these situations are ideal.

If the reason you develop these conditions or end up needing surgery is because of the negligence of a medical professional you could be eligible to claim compensation for medical negligence.

Scaphoid fractures are often missed or misdiagnosed when medical staff fails to take the appropriate X-rays of the injured area.

At A&E they should always attempt to take an X-ray when you first arrive to assess what damage has been done to the wrist area before you are being discharged. However, this is not always possible, as the injured area can be too swollen to get a clear picture of the injuries. If this is the case, A&E staff should request you to come back after a short period to get the X-rays taken when the swelling has gone down sufficiently. If they do not take the X-ray at the appropriate time, the X-ray result may not be telling the true story and your fracture could be missed.

Unfortunately, this does not always happen, and patients are being discharged or treated without the appropriate X-rays taken and scaphoid fractures are left undiagnosed and untreated as a result.

It’s also important to note that often X-rays should be taken from two angles, not one. If your medical professional didn’t take X-rays from both angles a scaphoid fracture can easily be missed.

Make a medical negligence claim for your misdiagnosed or undiagnosed scaphoid fracture and get compensated for your injury.

An undiagnosed or misdiagnosed scaphoid fracture can cause problems in your day-to-day life.

We saw an example of this in a recent case, where our client injured his wrist and visited A&E, where he was given a protective cast.

He went back a few weeks later and was told that there was no break, so the cast was taken off and replaced with a sling. At this time no X-ray was taken.

However, he believed that his wrist wasn’t recovering so used his private insurance to see another doctor for a second opinion.

Upon X-raying our client, this doctor confirmed that there was in fact a scaphoid fracture which was missed in the trip to A&E.

If your scaphoid fracture has been misdiagnosed causing you pain and suffering as a result, our industrial disease team can help you claim missed scaphoid fracture compensation.