"Hard cases," say the lawyers, "make bad law." That means something like, "Legislation works better when it’s drafted in response to average circumstances, not extreme ones."
This adage applies to our profession, too. You can learn more about how to practice and teach medicine from average cases than from rare and strange ones. Hard cases can make any of us look foolish.
Dr. Alan Rockoff
Peter e-mailed me the other day. I’d seen him 6 months ago for an eczematous rash on his back. Something funny about it, though: The distribution didn’t work, and it wasn’t scaly. No response to triamcinolone. Biopsy: Nonspecific inflammation. CBC: Elevated white cells at 15,600, mostly lymphs. Hmmm.
I referred him to an academic center. They presented him at Grand Rounds, and set him up for patch testing. He avoided what they asked him to, with little success.
"The oncologist says I have lymphoma," Peter’s e-mail to the patch test clinic read, copying me. He apologetically canceled his allergy clinic follow-up. "I hope for a good prognosis, although diagnosis has been delayed for several months. I hope my example will be of value for future patients."
Peter puts his regrets gently. How valuable will his lesson be? His case teaches that strange presentations of uncommon conditions can make even good and conscientious doctors look lame.
We all congratulate ourselves on "good pick-ups," the diagnostic coups that hit the nail on the head. Fair enough, but we understandably look away when we got it right by dumb luck or got it wrong.
That subcutaneous fullness we thought was fine, but which the patient insisted be removed (and turned out to be dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans). That dark spot that looked like all the others, only the patient was nervous because he was sure it had changed (melanoma). The funny rash that ended up being measles in an unimmunized child, and when was the last time you saw measles?
Often, we never even find out about the hard cases we missed, because the people who had them got fed up with us and went elsewhere. Sometimes, they send an angry letter or – more common these days – write a bad review. "I went to another doctor who finally figured out my problem and prescribed the right treatment." Once in a while, a lawsuit.
Viewed through the "retrospectoscope," knowing how the story turned out, our initial fumblings look pretty clumsy, if not downright actionable. "Oh, come on," a critic might say, "Surely that lump was too irregular for you to pass it off as a fibroma." Or: "Why the surprise? Didn’t he tell you the mole changed?" "The kid was sick and had a funny rash, didn’t she?" says a third. "Don’t you read the papers about all the parents who won’t vaccinate their children for fear of autism?"
I’m not suggesting that these are bad questions or that we shouldn’t ask them, so we can learn what we can. What I am saying is that, even if we do, no matter how careful and thoughtful we are, we are never going to catch everything we are unprepared for – the rare, the atypical, the unexpected.
This spring, the media reported details of an outbreak that occurred 5 years ago at New Orleans Children’s Hospital of what turned out to be mucormycosis; it proved fatal for several children. Looking back, mistakes were made. Diagnostic biopsies were only done when parents demanded them. Soiled laundry was mishandled. All this at a well-respected tertiary care center staffed by clinicians no doubt as fine as specialists anywhere.
The resulting investigation will no doubt find clinical and administrative gaps and address them. Consciousness will be raised, systems streamlined, oversight tightened. This loophole will be closed. Then others will open, no doubt the way they usually do, when people are looking at something else.
I knew there was something fishy about Peter’s case, but I didn’t know what it was. The experienced and thoughtful academic physicians I sent him to didn’t figure it out, either. It is nice of Peter to be philosophical about this. I would not begrudge him a less considerate reaction.
As for us, we ought to be vigilant, thorough, and humble. Should we get full of ourselves, there’s a hard case out there just waiting to deflate us.
Dr. Rockoff practices dermatology in Brookline, Mass. He is on the clinical faculty at Tufts University, Boston, and has taught senior medical students and other trainees for 30 years. Dr. Rockoff has contributed to the Under My Skin column in Skin & Allergy News since 1997.