You just got a letter that says a cancer, stroke, infection, or fracture was not identified when it should have been, and now the treatment is harder, riskier, or less likely to work. A delayed diagnosis means a medical condition was recognized later than a reasonably careful provider should have recognized it. The problem is not just that the diagnosis came late. The issue is whether the delay fell below the accepted standard of care and caused extra harm, such as disease progression, lost treatment options, added pain, or a worse outcome.

In a medical malpractice claim, timing matters because a bad result alone is not enough. The patient usually must show that a doctor, hospital, or other provider missed signs, failed to order appropriate testing, ignored symptoms, or did not follow up on abnormal results, and that the delay made the condition materially worse. That often requires medical records, expert review, and proof of causation.

In New York, delayed diagnosis cases can involve private hospitals or public ones, but the deadline may change depending on who is being sued. For claims against a New York City municipal hospital, New York Unconsolidated Laws § 7401(2) (1969) generally gives only 1 year and 90 days to file suit. In Brooklyn, these cases are filed in Kings County Supreme Court, and many are assigned to a specialized medical malpractice part.