A 34-year-old patient, Sally Arbogast, underwent a vaginal delivery but experienced sharp abdominal pain and moderate bleeding right afterward. She had delivered her last child by a Cesarean section. The obstetrician who cared for her performed a manual exploration and curettage procedure to rule out uterine scar rupture and later…
Michael Mals, 57, underwent a hip replacement at Lutheran General Hospital on Aug. 14, 2008. He was given Coumadin, a blood thinner, to prevent deep vein thrombosis (DVT). Three days later he was transferred to a nursing home for rehab where his INR (international normalized ratio) became supratherateutic and Coumadin…
A Will County, Ill., jury entered a $1,066,000 verdict against an orthopedic surgeon, David Burt, M.D. Virginia Faletti, 82, underwent endoscopic carpal tunnel release surgery on her right wrist at Edward Hospital. The surgery was done to relieve pressure on the median nerve because of crowding within the carpal tunnel…
Thomas Jackson, 57, underwent a hernia repair surgery by a general surgeon, the defendant, Dr. Kenneth Goldman. Hours after the surgery, Jackson complained of severe stomach pain. His condition deteriorated overnight; the next morning Jackson developed a fever and a rapid pulse. The hospital staff noted a decrease in urine…
In November 2008, 26-year-old Heather Hinshaw underwent gallbladder surgery at Trinity Medical Center in Rock Island, Ill. The general surgeon who did the surgery thought he saw a stone in the common bile duct during an intraoperative cholangiogram, which is a procedure using a catheter to inject dye into the…
It is estimated that 250,000 people die each year in the United States as a result of medical malpractice according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Approximately 80,000 Medicare patients suffer preventable adverse events that contribute to their deaths; as many as half of those deaths are…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago has affirmed a district court’s order dismissing a medical negligence case brought against the Department of Veteran Affairs. Jerome Augutis underwent reconstructive surgery on his right foot at Illinois’ Edward Hines Jr. Veterans Administration Hospital in July 2006. Because of…
On May 27, 2005, Dennis Swallow came to the office of the defendant internist, Dr. Bryan Moline, for preoperative clearance for an upcoming orthopedic hip surgery. Swallow was 51 years old at the time and had a history of a neurological event in 1996. He was taking 325 mg of aspirin daily as…
Nereida Sepulveda was an 80-year-old retiree who underwent a bilateral knee replacement surgery at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center on Nov. 9, 2009. The surgery was performed by an orthopedic surgeon, Dr. David Hoffman. Sepulveda suffered an artery occlusion in the right leg as a complication of the procedure. The defendant, Dr. Iyer,…
Jungie Kim underwent surgery to repair an abdominal aortic aneurysm at Rush Northshore Medical Center on Sept. 24, 2003. Kim was a 55-year-old housewife. The surgery was done by a vascular surgeon, Dr. Douglas Norman, a contracted employee at Rush Northshore. Following the surgery, Ms. Kim experienced severe ischemia in…