PHOENIX (AP) - A judge has awarded $2.5 million to a military veteran who said that his now-terminal cancer would have been curable had the Veterans Administration hospital in Phoenix diagnosed it sooner.
U.S. Magistrate Michelle Burns ruled Monday that a nurse practitioner who found abnormalities in Steven Cooper's prostate in 2011 should have ordered more testing.
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Instead, Cooper learned 11 months later that he had cancer.
Government lawyers say the nurse practitioner didn't turn up indications of cancer during the initial examination.
Phoenix was the epicenter of a scandal that revealed veterans on secret waiting lists who faced scheduling delays.
But there were no references to the scandal in Burns' decision or in trial arguments by Cooper's attorneys.
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