Justia Lawyer Rating for Robert D. Kreisman

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Sarita Kellman, 70, underwent treatment for a fractured left ankle. After the ankle was repaired at Bellevue Hospital Center, a nurse offered her the use of crutches. However, she requested an escort, telling the nurse that she was feeling lightheaded and that she could not use the crutches safely. The nurse refused Kellman’s request for an escort as she was being discharged from the hospital.

Kellman took a taxi home. While getting out of the cab, she fell, fracturing her right wrist and left ankle. This was the same ankle that had been fractured earlier. Kellman was taken back to the hospital where she underwent wrist surgery followed by a second ankle surgery and rehabilitation.

Kellman now suffers pain in her right wrist and restricted range of motion. She sued the hospital’s operator, alleging that the nurse was negligent in choosing not to provide her with an escort along with crutches.
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William Glynn Jr., 66, suffered an injury to his cervical spine in a car accident. He had limited use of his extremities following that incident. He underwent cervical spinal surgery at North Fulton Hospital and was gaining strength and showing signs of improvement.

However, three days after that surgery, hospital nurses tried to move Glynn from a reclining chair to his bed. They placed Glynn in a sling attached to a Hoyer lift, but his legs slid downward toward the floor. The hospital nurses pushed the Hoyer lift back toward the chair, which caused Glynn to strike his head against that chair.

The next day, Glynn awoke with new symptoms; a CT scan revealed a fractured-dislocation at C7 to T1. In spite of surgery about 40 hours after this incident, Glynn now suffers from incomplete quadriplegia and requires 24-hour-per-day care.
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Thomas Rogers was 54 years old when he underwent surgery at Optim Medical Center-Tattnall to remove a cervical disk at C-3. Later that night following the surgery, he complained of neck pain and difficulty speaking and swallowing.

Four hours later, a code blue was started. Despite four attempts to intubate, he died. He was survived by his wife.

Rogers’s wife, individually and on behalf of the Rogers’ estate, sued the hospital and Rogers’s attending physician claiming that the doctor and the hospital’s nurses chose not to respond to his postoperative complaints. It was also claimed that there was a failure to control Rogers’s bleeding at the surgical site.
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On June 26, 2014, Dr. Corey Solman performed arthroscopic surgery on the knee of Leslie Grussing. At her follow-up appointment on July 9, 2014, she met with a physician’s assistant and reported swelling in her knee. The physician’s assistant suggested physical therapy.

Dr. Solman did not examine her at that visit. Grussing returned to Dr. Solman’s office on July 18, 2014, again reporting pain and swelling in her knee.

Dr. Solman then removed fluid associated with the swelling from Grussing’s knee and observed that the synovial fluid looked normal. Dr. Solman did not test the fluid for infection.
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The State Supreme Court of Rhode Island has held that a trial judge improperly ordered a new trial based on the judge’s conclusion that a jury had misjudged the credibility of a witness. In this case, Stacia Aptt filed a lawsuit against Dr. Michael Baaklini alleging that the doctor had misdiagnosed her symptoms. He diagnosed her with a fatal kidney condition; she stated that this diagnosis caused her to suffer severe emotional distress.

At trial, the jury found in favor of the doctor. Aptt moved for a new trial. The trial judge, finding that the jury had come to the incorrect conclusion based on Aptt’s hyperemotional state while testifying at trial, ordered the defendant to agree to additur (added damages) or face a new trial on damages. The defendant appealed.

The State Supreme Court vacated and remanded the case noting that it is the fact finder’s duty to decide whether trial testimony is credible.
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In following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decisions in Daimlar AG v. Bauman, 134 S. Ct. 746 (2014) and BNSF Railway Company v. Tyrrleo, 137 S. Ct. 1549 (2017) and the Missouri Court’s earlier opinion in State ex rel. Norfolk S. Ry. Co. v. Dolan, 512 S.W. 3d 41 (Mo. En Banc 227), the Missouri Supreme Court has dismissed claims filed in the City of St. Louis by nonresident plaintiffs against Bayer Corp. and several subsidiaries for lack of personal jurisdiction.

The plaintiffs in this case had initiated an action against Bayer in St. Louis City Circuit Court to recover damages for personal injuries they allegedly experienced from their use of Essure, a medical device that Bayer manufactures and distributes. The case named 92 plaintiffs, but only seven were Missouri residents. The remaining 85 plaintiffs are not Missouri residents and do not allege they used Essure in Missouri or that they were injured in the state.

None of the Bayer defendants is incorporated in or has a principal place of business in Missouri; thus, these defendants are not “at home” in Missouri.
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A 20-year-old new mother identified as Ms. Doe collapsed at her home a week after delivering her baby prematurely. Two paramedics employed by Capital Health System Inc. arrived at her home. A student paramedic was training with the paramedics and was allowed to establish and monitor Ms. Doe’s airway before she was transported to the hospital. At the hospital, it was discovered that Ms. Doe’s endotracheal tube had been placed incorrectly.

Ms. Doe later died and was survived by her father and her infant child.

Ms. Doe’s father sued Capital Health System claiming that it chose not to act in good faith and allowed the student ENT to attempt to intubate Ms. Doe.
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Albert Ragin experienced unexplained weight loss and night sweating. At the time he was in his 80s. CT scans without contrast of his chest, abdomen, and pelvis revealed a left kidney cyst, but there were no other kidney abnormalities.

About a year later, in 2013, a renal artery Doppler test showed a possible aortic dissection. Ragin subsequently underwent several CT scans with contrast.

An employee of the defendant in this case, Advanced Radiology, interpreted the CT scans as showing no aortic dissection and no kidney abnormalities except for the several cysts in both kidneys.
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Stephanie Hollingsworth, 26, suffered from lupus and bilateral arm and leg pain. She was admitted to a hospital’s cardiac care unit where she was diagnosed as having acute vasculitis secondary to Sjogren’s syndrome, an immune system disorder.

The rheumatologist assigned to her care was Dr. Yvonne Sherrer, who ordered a STAT dermatology consultation and a skin biopsy, which showed necrotizing vasculitis. Hollingsworth, who was taking broad-spectrum antibiotics, developed a foot drop. Neurological assessments showed abnormalities of her lower extremities.

Dr. Sherrer transferred her to another facility three days later. Staff at this hospital administered Cytoxan for her necrotizing vasculitis on or around the third day of that admission.
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Under the Illinois Code of Civil Procedure Section 2-1009, an Illinois plaintiff is allowed to voluntarily dismiss all or part of a claim without prejudice before a trial or a hearing begins. The statute allows this process upon payment of costs. Related to Section 2-1009 is Illinois Supreme Court Rule 219(e), which states, “A party shall not be permitted to avoid compliance with discovery deadlines, orders or applicable rules by voluntarily dismissing a lawsuit.”

Continuing, Rule 219 says: “In establishing discovery deadlines and ruling on permissible discovery and testimony, the court shall consider discovery undertaken (or the absence of same), any misconduct, and orders entered in prior litigation involving a party. . .”

In the case of Boehle v. OSF Healthcare System, a medical-malpractice lawsuit, the claim was for a failure to diagnose and treat a cancerous growth in the spine of the patient.
The alleged medical negligence led to the death of the plaintiff’s son.
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