Medical malpractice: Dissection of LAD during cardiac catheterization

LAD is the acronym for the left anterior descending artery of the heart.

LAD supplies the heart, with blood. A heart’s chamber needs a large supply of oxygenated blood to properly function and effectively pump blood to organs and other areas of the body. Blood flows from the heart into the aorta into the left coronary artery, which branches into the LAD. Blood flows from the LAD into arterial branches and coronary capillaries, where oxygen is released into the heart muscle. The left anterior descending coronary artery (LAD) is usually the largest of the three main coronary arteries. LAD and its branches provide blood flow to a large portion of the left ventricle, the main pumping chamber.

Problems with the LAD include heart attack, heart disease, angina, cardiac arrest, hypertension and atherosclerosis.

When a person goes to the hospital with chest pains, ER doctors should be sufficiently skilled to determine whether or not a person is experiencing heart damage or a heart attack. Failure to properly diagnose can result in heart failure or death.

Failure to properly diagnose LAD

When a person goes to the hospital with chest pains, shortness of breath, sweating, nausea, EKG changes, and cardiac arrhythmias, he may also be suffering from afflictions to the LAD. An aortic dissection is when the main artery carrying blood away from the heart tears. When this happens… loss of blood, malfunction to the heart, and rapid death cannot be far behind unless it is diagnosed correctly and repaired surgically. Unfortunately, it is frequently and the patient may be erroneously given an anticoagulant or thrombolytic drugs which will result in death.

Another LAD problem has to do with cardiac catheterization. Cardiac catheterization involves passing a thin flexible tube or catheter into the right or left side of the heart, usually from the groin or the arm. When the sheath is removed and there is severe pain and a drop in blood pressure, internal bleeding needs to be addressed and surgically corrected.

In a related LAD problem when an angioplasty is performed on the left anterior descending artery and entered with various catheters, balloons, and stents, the stent may not expand fully against the vessel wall making each stent attempt more dangerous. With all this intervention, a perforation could occur in the LAD causing death.

Contact Our Dissected LAD Lawyers Today »

There are so many things that can go wrong from an inexperienced surgeon to a misdiagnosis to any number of bad practices. Has a family member died from dissected LAD cardiac catheterization medical malpractice? If the answer is yes, then act now and contact a medical malpractice attorney at Anapol Schwartz.

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