Posts Tagged ‘ hospital errors ’

During a routine colonoscopy in 2008, a non-cancerous polyp was found inside the colon of a Bucks County, Pa., woman.

But instead of removing the polyp through a minimally-invasive colonoscopy or an endoscopic procedure, her doctor performed a colon re-section, removing 2.5 feet of her colon and then surgically putting the remainder back together, according to a recent story in The Legal Intelligencer.

The problem, though, occurred when the more-invasive surgical re-section failed and leaked her fecal matter into her bloodstream and body, leading to a septic infection that kept the woman in the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania for 305 days, the story said.

Eleven days after her failed first surgery, Mariann Pomroy required a second surgery and was fitted with a colostomy bag. But her medical problems still were far from over.

Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/djgunner

“When Pomroy was finally released home, she was confined to a hospital bed, dependent upon oxygen and needed kidney dialysis,” reported The Legal Intelligencer. Three hundred and sixty-four days later, on Aug. 12, 2010, Pomroy died, the victim of a medical malpractice tragedy.

It wasn’t supposed to be that way.

The procedure was supposed to be a routine removal of a non-cancerous, abnormal growth of tissue.

Instead, Pomroy, who had undergone four previous abdominal surgeries, suffered severe complications that contributed to her eventual death. She was 57 when she died.

The two sides disagreed in court about how a decision was reached regarding the procedure she would eventually undergo.

Her surgeon, Dr. Ernest F. Rosato, “said that he recommended a colonoscopy to Pomroy but she opted for the surgery out of fear of having perforations,” according to the story. ” However, Pomroy’s husband [George], who attended the appointment with her, said that the advice was for Pomroy to have a colon resection, and he brought up if there was an easier way to remove the polyp.”

After her death, Pomroy’s family sued the doctor and the hospital, alleging serious medical errors were made in providing her care.

On Feb. 26, a Philadelphia jury awarded her family $19.5 million in damages by an 11-1 verdict, reported The Legal Intelligencer. The verdict included $10.5 million in wrongful death damages and $9 million in survival damages.

This tragic case is a somber reminder of the kinds of problems that can arise when patients seek medical treatment in hospitals and other medical facilities and become innocent victims of overzealous, inadequate or incorrect procedures.

Patients and their families must be vigilant about the medical care they receive so they know what is being done for a patient’s care every step of the way. But at the same time, patients and families aren’t doctors and they can’t know every question to ask.

That’s where skilled, expert, compassionate and thorough legal representation is needed by patients and their families who have been harmed by medical errors or omissions during their treatment. These kinds of cases happen on a regular basis, but they can be fought by legal teams that are prepared to battle for their clients’ rights all along the way to a fair settlement or to a just verdict.

We here at MyPhillyLawyer stand ready to assist you with your legal case if you or a loved one is ever seriously injured in a medical malpractice or related case anywhere in the United States. We represent the families of victims who die in such tragedies as well, to ensure that their families receive every penny of damages that they are eligible to receive.

Call MyPhillyLawyer at 215-227-2727 or toll-free at 1-866-920-0352 anytime and our experienced, compassionate, aggressive team of attorneys and support staff will be there for you and your family every step of the way as we manage your case through the legal system.

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Each year, some 4,000 surgical patients in the United States are seriously injured when items used during their procedures, from sponges to medical instruments, are accidentally left inside their bodies when their medical teams sew them back up.

The problem of retained surgical items has been an issue for years and has led surgeons and medical facilities to look for new methods to prevent such items being left behind inside patients in the first place, according to a story in The New York Times.

“In most operating rooms, a nurse keeps a manual count of the sponges a surgeon uses in a procedure,” the story reported. “But in that busy and sometimes chaotic environment, miscounts occur, and every so often a sponge ends up on the wrong side of the stitches.”

A surgical team is in the midst of a medical procedure in this stock photo. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/uchar

Systems are now available that can track every sponge and instrument used inside a patient with tiny Radio-Frequency Identification tags that can automatically report when every sponge and instrument is removed. Dozens of sponges might be used inside a patient during a procedure, which makes them vulnerable to being forgotten during surgery.

“In a study published in the October issue of The Journal of the American College of Surgeons, researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill looked at 2,285 cases in which sponges were tracked using a system called RF Assure Detection,” The New York Times reported. “At the end of an operation, a detector alerts the surgical team if any sponges remain inside the patient. In the U.N.C. study, the system helped recover 23 forgotten sponges from almost 3,000 patients over 11 months.”

The RFID tag system adds about $10 to the cost of a surgical procedure, the story reported.

Another system designed to prevent such medical mistakes uses barcodes on sponges and medical instruments that are scanned as they are used on a patient and then scanned again as they are removed. If something is left behind, the surgical teams will know it because the inventory of items used and then removed will be off.

For victims, these kinds of medical mistakes can be intensely painful and lead to major health problems.

One such victim was a nurse in Kentucky who became ill with crushing pain in her abdomen one night while she was working in 2005, the Times reported. The next day, a CT scan discovered a surgical sponge that had been left behind inside her abdomen when she had undergone a hysterectomy four years before. When doctors went in to remove it, they found that it caused a spreading infection that required the removal of a large section of her intestine. The patient sued the hospital and won a $2.5 million verdict, but the award was appealed and remains in legal limbo.

In August, a Fresno, Calif.-based hospital was fined $50,000 by state investigators after surgeons accidentally left a surgical towel inside a patient which was discovered four months later after she suffered serious health problems post-surgery, according to a story by KFSN News. It was the fourth violation reported against the hospital, Saint Agnes Medical Center, since 2007, according to the story.

Since that case, “the hospital developed a policy to inventory objects, such as instruments and sponges used during surgeries,” the story reported. “Hospital staff also switched operating room towels from the color blue, to white towels that can be detected in x-rays.”

In December of 2011, a New Philadelphia, Ohio man won a $275,000 settlement from a veteran’s hospital after two surgical towels were left inside his abdomen during kidney cancer surgery in 2008, according to a story by CBS News.

The tragedy is that these kinds of medical mistakes could be prevented through electronic tracking systems that are presently available such as the RFID and barcode systems, but many hospitals continue to fight such fixes, the Times reported.

One hospital that is doing proactive work to prevent these kinds of medical errors is Harrison Medical Center in Bremerton, Wash., where they in 2010 adopted a patient safety program called NoThing Left Behind.

“The issue of foreign objects, and most specifically sponges, being left behind in surgical cases is a serious issue,” the hospital states on its website. The program “provides a three-level approach to accounting for surgical objects,” including the mandatory use of X-ray detectable sponges or towels during surgeries, as well as manual sponge counts by surgical team members. Also required are the use of hanging sponge holders and a white board to carefully and accurately track the sponges that are used, as well as confirmation by the surgeons that all devices have been extracted, the hospital states.

“Those efforts paid off,” the hospital reported. “In 2011, Harrison had no items, including sponges, being unaccounted for at the end of the surgery.”

NoThing Left Behind was started in October of 2004 by Dr. Verna C. Gibbs, a professor of surgery at the University of California in San Francisco, to fight against such medical mistakes.

For patients who suffer serious medical traumas and long-term medical complications from incidents of medical sponges and devices that are left behind, such changes cannot come quickly enough.

These kinds of medical errors can be prevented simply through the use of tracking systems that are available, affordable and smart.

No surgical patients should have to suffer from these kinds of injuries in the future.

It’s time to make such systems mandatory for patient safety.

Meanwhile, if you or a family member is ever injured due to a medical error, you should get the best legal advice you can find to learn your legal options so you can recover damages for your injuries and suffering.

We here at MyPhillyLawyer stand ready to assist you with your legal case if you or a loved one is ever seriously injured in a medical malpractice or related case anywhere in the United States. We represent the families of victims who die in such tragedies as well, to ensure that their families receive every penny of damages that they are eligible to receive.

Call MyPhillyLawyer at 215-227-2727 or toll-free at 1-866-920-0352 anytime and our experienced, compassionate, aggressive team of attorneys and support staff will be there for you and your family every step of the way as we manage your case through the legal system.

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The family of a 53-year-old woman who died after surgery won a $6 million jury verdict in York County in a recent wrongful death case against the medical team that treated her.

In what is believed to be the largest York County jury award in several years, the jury ruled in favor of the family of the victim, 53-year-old Sherrie Ann Burkhardt, who died Dec. 19, 2007, two days after she underwent emergency surgery at York Hospital, according to a story in The York Daily Record.

Burkhardt, of Seven Valleys, Pa., had been admitted to the hospital complaining of chest pains.

After she arrived at the hospital, a surgeon examined her and performed a cardiac catheterization on the patient, according to a story in The Legal Intelligencer.  The examination found that Burkhardt’s right heart artery was almost completely obstructed and required three stents.

Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/babyblueut

Complications began after the patient was moved to the hospital’s medical surgical intensive care unit following the surgery, according to The Legal Intelligencer.  During court testimony, one of the doctors on Burkhardt’s medical team said he told another doctor about observing abnormal abdominal bleeding in the patient after the surgery.  The other doctor, however, testified that he was “only made aware of a transient drop in blood pressure and would have ordered all the proper tests had he known Burkhardt’s full list of symptoms.”

That poor communication between the doctors was a key part of the Burkhardt family’s case against the medical team and the hospital. “The complaint alleged her death was the post-surgery result of a lack of communication and violation of patient safety rules by doctors at York Hospital and Cardiac Diagnostic Associates,” reported The York Daily Record.

Ultimately, that meant that the victim didn’t receive adequate care following the surgery.

In a pre-trial memorandum, the Burckhardt family alleged that neither doctor “continued to inform any cardiologist, as had been ordered, about the drop in blood pressure and increase in heart rate, nor did they advise of the hallmark symptoms of bleeding, back pain, abdominal pain, distension and tenderness, gray skin pallor, anxiety, agitation and labored respirations,” according to The Legal Intelligencer. “Either way, all the symptoms the plaintiff pled as hallmark signs of internal bleeding were documented in Sherrie Burkhardt’s medical records only 10 minutes after she arrived in the intensive care unit and three hours before she coded and went into cardiac arrest.”

The Burkhardt family was awarded $5 million for wrongful death and $1 million for any treatment injuries that Burkhardt suffered before she died, according to the paper.

This tragic case illustrates the dangers and risks that patients can face when undergoing medical procedures in emergencies. Split-second decisions made by doctors, nurses and other medical staff members can have huge and instant negative impacts on patients when they are most vulnerable during medical emergencies. And poor communication about patients and their ongoing treatment among medical team members can be devastating, and deadly.

That’s why if you or a family member is ever involved in such a situation you should get the best legal advice you can find to learn your legal options so you can recover damages for your injuries and suffering.

We here at MyPhillyLawyer stand ready to assist you with your legal case if you or a loved one is ever seriously injured in a medical malpractice or related case anywhere in the United States. We represent the families of victims who die in such tragedies as well, to ensure that their families receive every penny of damages that they are eligible to receive.

Call MyPhillyLawyer at 215-227-2727 or toll-free at 1-866-920-0352 anytime and our experienced, compassionate, aggressive team of attorneys and support staff will be there for you and your family every step of the way as we manage your case through the legal system.

When Winning Matters Most, Call MyPhillyLawyer.

Serious infections after liposuction surgery have caused the death of one patient and sickened two others, forcing the closing of a Timonium, Md., medical facility while authorities work to determine how the death and illnesses could have occurred.

Officials at the Monarch Medspa surgery center “are cooperating as Maryland and Baltimore County health officials investigate the source of the infections, which involve the same bacteria that causes strep throat,” according to a story in The Baltimore Sun.  “But the bacteria can be significantly more dangerous when infecting other parts of the body, sometimes causing shock, organ failure and even death.”

All three patients became ill after undergoing liposuction procedures at the facility, according to the paper. The 59-year-old woman who died, whose identity was not released due to medical privacy laws, underwent liposuction surgery at the facility in the beginning of September, then returned to the surgery center the next day and complained of extensive bleeding, The Sun reported. She was sent home, then family members later called an ambulance after her condition worsened. After being taken to two different hospitals for treatment, she died after medical staff members were unable to stop the post-surgical infection that was coursing through her body, The Sun reported.

A surgical team is in the midst of a medical procedure in this stock photo. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/uchar

“In an order closing the center, state health officials said inspectors at the facility Tuesday observed ‘probable deviations from standard infection control practices,’” the paper reported. Proper sterilization of all instruments, dressings and every other item used on a patient before, during and after surgeries is critical to preventing such infections in the first place and those procedures are mandatory.

Now Maryland state health department officials are looking at whether they should increase oversight of cosmetic surgery centers, The Sun reported. “While doctors and nurses working in the centers must be board-certified, the centers themselves are not required to be licensed,” the paper said.

The three patients contracted infections of a bacteria known as group A staphylococcus, according to the story. Symptoms of post-surgical problems for patients can include fever, redness at a wound site, abrupt onset of pain, and swelling, dizziness, weakness and confusion, Maryland health officials told The Sun.

The surgery center has other locations in Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware, and offers many types of cosmetic surgeries, including liposuction, face lifts, Botox and more, according to The Sun.

For the victims and their families, these tragic cases illustrate the importance of knowing the credentials and qualifications of surgeons, medical staff and the facilities in which they work before undergoing invasive and potentially dangerous medical procedures.

That means ensuring that any surgery center you or a loved one might use is fully certified, regulated and licensed so that it follows all accepted medical practices related to treatment, infections, post-operative care and the rest.

There can be no shortcuts in such cases, because the ongoing health of you and your loved ones is at stake. You must ask probing questions of health care workers and facilities to ensure that they will have your best interests at heart as you are given care, from start to finish.

Yet if all of that still fails and you or a loved one are seriously injured due to an errant medical procedure in a surgery center, cosmetic surgery office, hospital, clinic, doctor’s office or any other medical facility, you should get the best legal advice you can find to learn your legal options so you can recover damages for your injuries and suffering.

We here at MyPhillyLawyer stand ready to assist you with your legal case if you or a loved one is ever seriously injured in a medical malpractice or related case anywhere in the United States. We represent the families of victims who die in such tragedies as well, to ensure that their families receive every penny of damages that they are eligible to receive.

Call MyPhillyLawyer at 215-227-2727 or toll-free at 1-866-920-0352 anytime and our experienced, compassionate, aggressive team of attorneys and support staff will be there for you and your family every step of the way as we manage your case through the legal system.

When Winning Matters Most, Call MyPhillyLawyer.

When 38-year-old Melvin A. Dillard Jr. felt chest pains June 26, he was rushed to a hospital in Lewes, Del., where he was checked out by medical personnel in the emergency room and then later released.

But while Dillard was sitting in the ER lobby waiting for a ride home at Beebe Medical Center, he apparently suffered a heart attack and died, then his body was not discovered by hospital personnel until the next morning, according to a story in The (Wilmington, DE) News Journal.

“The family now is alleging medical negligence and wrongful death in a lawsuit against Beebe and Sussex Emergency Associates, which operates the hospital’s ER department, and is seeking damages,” according The News Journal. “The family alleges that given Dillard’s symptoms and history of cardiac issues, he should have been admitted for observation and not sent away.”

Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/djgunner

The hospital issued a statement saying that Dillard “was seen, treated appropriately following all protocols and was discharged in stable condition,” the story reported. “While sleeping in the lobby waiting for a ride, the individual passed away.”

When he arrived at the hospital by ambulance, Dillard, who lived in Newark, Del., “was showing signs ‘consistent with an impending cardiac event’ and upon admission to the ER had an abnormal EKG,” the paper reported. “It is unclear what happened next, but Dillard was discharged with instructions to follow up with his cardiologist, according to the suit.”

After he was seen, he apparently couldn’t immediately get a ride home so he waited in the lobby, perhaps for a bus, the story said. “At some unknown time, Dillard then had a fatal heart attack but no one noticed.”

His lifeless body remained in the ER waiting area until he was found the next day, the family’s lawsuit states. He was rushed back into the ER when he was finally found, but he was eventually pronounced dead. Rigor mortis, when the body’s muscles stiffen naturally after death, had already set in, which indicated that his death had occurred at least several hours before he was found, according to the story.

Emergency room treatment injuries or deaths are not uncommon. In June, a Waverly, Md., family was awarded a $55 million verdict by a Baltimore Circuit Court jury for severe injuries suffered by their newborn son during his birth in March of 2010. In that case, the mother of the baby was rushed to a Baltimore hospital by ambulance for an emergency Caesarean section, but instead of being instantly taken into an emergency room for immediate surgery, she had to wait for more than two hours until the procedure was started. That delay, according to a lawsuit she filed against Johns Hopkins Hospital, meant that critically-needed medical care wasn’t given to her son in time, resulting in his being born with severe, life-changing birth defects.

The award was one of the largest in Maryland history for a medical malpractice case.

Medical negligence and malpractice cases like these highlight the kinds of problems that can arise whenever patients seek medical treatment in hospitals and other medical facilities. Medical errors, when incorrect procedures are undertaken or incorrect medicines are given, are two types of issues that happen, but delays in receiving critically-needed care are also problematic for patients.

These kinds of cases are clear reminders that patients and their families must be vigilant about the medical care that they receive.

The horror of suffering serious injuries or losing a loved one due to such an incident is horrifying, especially because they were in a medical facility to get help and ended up becoming the victim of a tragedy.

Patients and families aren’t doctors and they can’t know every question to ask of medical professionals in times of crisis. That’s where skilled, expert, compassionate and thorough legal representation is needed by patients and their families who have been harmed by negligence, malpractice, medical errors or omissions during their treatment.

We here at MyPhillyLawyer stand ready to assist you with your legal case if you or a loved one is ever seriously injured in a medical malpractice or related case anywhere in the United States. We represent the families of victims who die in such tragedies as well, to ensure that their families receive every penny of damages that they are eligible to receive.

Call MyPhillyLawyer at 215-227-2727 or toll-free at 1-866-920-0352 anytime and our experienced, compassionate, aggressive team of attorneys and support staff will be there for you and your family every step of the way as we manage your case through the legal system.

When Winning Matters Most, Call MyPhillyLawyer.

Sometimes the serious injuries that medical patients undergo happen after they’re admitted to the hospital.

Medical mistakes, the kind that happen when a doctor accidentally treats the wrong patient in a busy emergency room or leaves a surgical instrument inside a patient’s body during surgery, occur all too frequently in the United States.

The problem is, that unlike everyday mistakes where you make a wrong turn on a highway or bring home the wrong flavor of ice cream from the store, medical mistakes made by health care workers and doctors can kill you.

And it’s not as difficult to imagine as you might think.

In a recent report on CNN.com, senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen reported on 25 kinds of medical mistakes that happen in medical facilities, as part of the news network’s “Empowered Patient” series.

A surgical team works on a patient in an operating room in this stock photo. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/Platinus

One segment, titled “10 Shocking Medical Mistakes,” outlined 10 of the most common mistakes and how they can be prevented from happening using some basic procedural changes and common sense steps that could be easily implemented.

Among the problems are doctors who have dirty hands when they treat patients, doctors who conduct surgeries on the wrong body part and medical tests that can cause bald spots, the network reported.

“Medical errors kill more than a quarter million people every year in the United States and injure millions,” CNN reported. “Add them all up and ‘you have probably the third leading cause of death’ in the country,” Dr. Peter Pronovost, an anesthesiologist and critical care physician at Johns Hopkins Hospital, told CNN.

That’s a lot of patients.

“When you’re a patient, you trust you’re in good hands, but even the best doctor or nurse can make a mistake on you or someone you love,” the CNN story reported. “Mistakes are happening every day in every hospital in the country that we’re just not catching,” Dr. Albert Wu, an internist at Johns Hopkins Hospital, told CNN.

To prevent patient injuries and complications, CNN noted 10 typical medical mistakes and offers advice on how patients can become more involved in their own health care so they can avoid becoming a victim:

1. Medical teams treating the wrong patient who might have a similar name can happen when “hospital staff fails to verify a patient’s identity,” according to CNN. To prevent such errors you or a family member should “make sure the staff checks your entire name, date of birth and barcode on your wrist band” before any medical procedure in a hospital.

2. Surgical tools being left inside a patient’s body can occur when the “surgical staff miscounts (or fails to count) equipment used inside a patient during an operation,” according to CNN. “If you have unexpected pain, fever or swelling after surgery, ask if you might have a surgical instrument inside you.”

3. Patients who are suffering from dementia are sometimes prone to wandering and “may become trapped … and die from hypothermia or dehydration,” CNN reported. “If your loved one sometimes wanders, consider a GPS tracking bracelet.”

4. Sometimes “con artists pretend to be doctors” and the result is medical treatments that make patients even sicker when they arrived, according to CNN. “Confirm online that your physician is licensed” before treatment begins.

5. Crowded, busy hospital emergency rooms mean that very sick patients often wait to be treated, causing their pain and suffering to increase and potentially complicating their overall treatment. That kind of “ER waiting game” happens when overcrowded hospitals don’t have enough beds, according to CNN. To prevent that, call ahead. “Doctors listen to other doctors, so on your way to the hospital call your physician and ask them to call the emergency room,” CNN suggests.

6. Be aware of the possibility of air bubbles in the blood if a hole in a patient’s chest isn’t sealed airtight after a chest tube is removed, CNN reports. Such air bubbles “get sucked into the wound and cut off blood supply to the patient’s lungs, heart, kidneys and brain. Left uncorrected the patient dies.” To prevent such problems, patients who are treated with a chest tube should “ask how you should be positioned when the line comes out.”

7. Surgery on the wrong body part can occur when “a patient’s chart is incorrect, or a surgeon misreads it, or surgical draping obscures marks that denote the correct side of the operation,” according to CNN. To protect yourself from such a mistake, “make sure you reaffirm with the nurse and the surgeon the correct body part and side of your operation.”

8. Dirty hands spread infection and it can happen when doctors and nurses don’t wash their hands. “It may be uncomfortable to ask, but make sure doctors and nurses wash their hands before they touch you, even if they’re wearing gloves,” CNN reports.

9. Medical tubes to various life-saving devices, such as chest tubes and feeding tubes “can look a lot alike,” causing patients to receive improper and potentially deadly treatment, CNN reports. To avoid such errors, “ask the staff to trace every tube back to the point of origin so the right medicine goes to the right place” if you are fitted with tubes as part of your treatment.

10. Waking up during surgery is not a good thing, but it can occur if a patient isn’t given enough anesthesia. “The brain stays awake while the muscles stay frozen,” CNN reports. “Most patients aren’t in any pain but some feel every poke, prod and cut.” To prevent such possibilities, “ask your surgeon if you need to be put asleep or if a local anesthetic might work just as well” before your surgery is scheduled.

Medical errors can cause great pain, anguish and long-term side effects for patients, as well as possible death. They are a very serious matter.

You have a role in preventing such tragedies from happening to you or a loved on by making sure that you take an active role in your medical care. That means being an advocate for a loved one as they deal with their medical treatment or having a loved one act as your health care advocate if you are receiving treatment.

That means asking lots of pertinent questions and getting satisfactory answers from medical professionals before allowing treatments to go on.

That also means knowing your rights as a patient so that the proper care is given at the proper time.

Insurance companies can also fight patients as they seek care for medical issues and advocacy is also a prime defense against such complications and roadblocks.

Often, though, medical errors will require experienced, compassionate and competent legal advice and help so that patients and their families can receive compensation after they are seriously injured by medical facilities and staff members.

We here at MyPhillyLawyer stand ready to assist you and provide compassionate care in the event that you or a loved one is seriously injured due to a medical mistake. Call us for a consultation and tell us your story.

When Winning Matters Most, call MyPhillyLawyer.