When will a doctor be held liable for negligence for failing to diagnose and treat a patient properly?
British Columbia, Canada
The following excerpt is from Lyon v. Ridge Meadows Hospital, 2007 BCSC 1000 (CanLII):
When a doctor acts in accordance with a recognized and respectable practice of the profession, that doctor will not be deemed negligent. It is assumed by the courts that the medical profession has adopted procedures which reflect the best interests of patients; therefore, liability only follows where there has been a violation of universally accepted rules of medicine. Even where there are competing theories and multiple available methods of treatment, a physician will not be held liable if the diagnosis and treatment they give to a patient corresponds to those recognized by medical science at the time: ter Neuzen v. Korn (1995), 1995 CanLII 72 (SCC), 127 D.L.R. (4th) 577, [1995] 3 S.C.R. 674.
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