Patient death ‘likely’ avoided if GP ordered ECG and troponin tests: coroner
The GP diagnosed the patient's ongoing chest pain as costochondritis.
A coroner has criticised a rural GP for not ordering an ECG or troponin tests for a patient who repeatedly presented with chest pain.
It took eight days for the 72-year-old to receive a diagnosis of MI, by which time his survival chances were put at 5%, the coroner heard.
Ronald Bromage, who was living in a caravan park in SA’s Eyre Peninsula, was diagnosed with hypercholesterolaemia three years before his death, based on a fasting lipid test conducted alongside an ECG.
In February 2016, he consulted a different GP in the area with non-radiating chest pain.
