Justia Lawyer Rating for Robert D. Kreisman

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In this medical malpractice case, plaintiff Daniel Hemminger sued defendants Jeffrey LeMay, M.D., and his medical practice for damages related to the death of Hemminger’s wife, Tina. The lawsuit alleged that the defendants chose not to diagnose and treat her cervical cancer in a timely fashion, which caused her death by lessening her chance of survival. At the close of the plaintiff’s case, the trial judge granted the defendants’ motion for directed verdict finding that Hemminger had failed to present sufficient evidence to show that Dr. LeMay’s negligence was the proximate cause of the woman’s death under a lost chance of survival theory. Hemminger took this appeal.

Tina Hemminger saw Dr. LeMay, an obstetrician/gynecologist, on June 23, 2000 complaining of abdominal pain and spotting. Dr. LeMay completed a pelvic examination, which showed that her cervix was abnormally large and firm. There was no biopsy ordered. Dr. LeMay did not order a microscopic examination of her cervix. About 6 months later, she was diagnosed with cervical cancer. Her cancer was Stage 3B, which has a 5-year survival rate of 32%. She died of metastatic cervical cancer on April 7, 2002.

Her husband sued Dr. LeMay for medical negligence claiming that he was negligent in choosing not to order tests that would have detected his wife’s cervical cancer in 2000. The lawsuit further alleged that had Dr. LeMay diagnosed the cancer in June 2000 rather than in December 2000, she would have had a significantly better chance of surviving the cancer.

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Ethel Bolton had been a resident of Glenshire Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Richton Park, Ill. She was there from 2001 until 2006. During the years 2004 through 2006, she was cared for by internist Dr. Lance Wallace.

On July 7, 2005, Bolton had an abnormal albumin level of 3.2, which is a sign of malnutrition.

Beginning on Sept. 30, 2005, Bolton also had skin breakdowns and bedsores, which worsened over the next four months. On Jan. 29, 2006, Bolton’s daughter, Margaret, noticed at the nursing home that her mother was naked in a backroom in a general state of neglect showing signs of malnutrition, dehydration, emaciation and multiple areas of skin breakdown and bedsores.

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Katherine Crawford was admitted to Westlake Community Hospital for shortness of breath and hypotension following an arterial venous fistula repair surgery of Sept. 17, 2005. She was 38 years old and was an end-stage renal disease patient. Crawford had been on dialysis for 11 years. Her medical history also included COPD, obstructive sleep apnea, chronic hypotension, hypertension and pulmonary hypertension.

The defendant internist, Dr. Karim Yunez, was the attending physician for the hospitalization of Sept. 17, 2005 and had previously treated Crawford during prior admissions to the hospital.

The defendant nephrologist, Dr. Constantine Dellis, was consulted to handle the patient’s dialysis needs during her hospitalization.

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Maria Lastra-Rico was 45 years old when she underwent a breast biopsy. A pathologist interpreted the test as showing invasive ductal carcinoma; she underwent a double mastectomy with lymph node resection and subsequent surgical reconstruction.

She later learned that she in fact had ductal carcinoma in situ, which is noninvasive ductal carcinoma.

Lastra-Rico sued the pathologist and the pathologists’ supervisor who provided a second opinion claiming liability for the misdiagnosis. Lastra-Rico then maintained that had the defendants performed a staining procedure to confirm and ensure the proper diagnosis, she would have undergone a lumpectomy and radiation and avoided the mastectomies altogether. The lawsuit did not claim lost income. After the jury trial, the jury entered a verdict in the plaintiff’s favor in the amount of $2,230,000.

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Charles Blevins, 63, underwent outpatient arthroscopic knee surgery. Four days after the surgery, Blevins went to a hospital emergency room complaining of fever and a hot and swollen knee. He was diagnosed as having pseudomonas infection and required hospitalization for one month; during that time he received IV antibiotics.

The infection, however, destroyed Blevins’s right knee joint, which necessitated a total knee replacement and required revision about a year later.

Blevins filed a lawsuit against the surgical center alleging the use of unsterile surgical instruments. According to Blevins’s lawsuit, at least 3 other patients contracted the same type of infection during the 10-day period surrounding his surgery. The lawsuit did not claim lost income.

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Cynthia and Kenneth Williams’s first child was born with sickle cell anemia. After the birth of their first child, the Williamses found out that they both had the sickle cell trait in which a normal gene is paired with the allele that causes sickle-shaped hemoglobin.

Individuals who carry this sickle cell trait usually don’t have symptoms of the blood disorder because their normal gene creates functional hemoglobin. However, when a baby is born from parents who both have the sickle cell trait, there is a 25% chance of getting two of the abnormal genes and the full-blown sickle cell disease for the child.

The Williamses were unwilling to take a chance with a second baby, and Cynthia decided to have tubal ligation. However, Cynthia became pregnant again allegedly because her physician, Dr. Byron Rosner, failed to close off one of her fallopian tubes during the sterilization surgery.

The Williams’s second child was born with the sickle cell disease.

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On Dec. 29, 2008, Camilla Hayes, 76, came to the emergency room at Rush Oak Park Hospital complaining of abdominal pain. The emergency room doctor, Dr. Joseph DiPiazza, did not order a complete cardiac workup. She was later diagnosed and treated for gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). However, Hayes was in process of being discharged from the hospital after four and a half hours in the ER when she suddenly collapsed and died. She is survived by two adult children. No autopsy was performed and the parties agreed that she most likely died from a sudden cardiac arrest based on her multiple risk factors for cardiac disease, including hypertension, high cholesterol, morbid obesity and a history of smoking.

The family filed a lawsuit against the doctor and his practice, claiming that Dr. DiPiazza was negligent in choosing not to properly evaluate Hayes’ symptoms from a cardiac standpoint, choosing not to diagnose her cardiac condition, choosing not to order cardiac enzyme tests and serial EKGs, and discharging her instead of admitting her to a telemetry floor for observation.

The family also maintained that the hospital nurses did not determine the exact location of Hayes’s burning discomfort at the time of triage and chose not to initiate the nursing standing orders for unexplained chest pain.

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Karol Stawarz was complaining to his primary care physician, Dr. Victor Forys, about his lower abdominal pain. Dr. Forys diagnosed gastroenteritis and prescribed medicine. He also told Stawarz to follow up in 24 hours or go directly to the hospital if his condition got worse.

On the following day, Stawarz went to a hospital where he was diagnosed as having a perforated appendix. Stawarz required an emergency appendectomy and later developed a fistula, which necessitated a temporary colostomy.

Stawarz and his wife  sued Dr. Forys and his medical practice, claiming that Dr. Forys chose not to timely diagnose the appendicitis by ordering a stat CT scan and sending Stawarz directly to the hospital after that examination.

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Guadalupe Ramirez had a history of congestive heart failure.  She was also an insulin-dependent diabetic, had mitral valve regurgitation, atrial fibrillation, rheumatic heart disease, high blood pressure and a prosthetic heart valve.  Ramirez, 72, underwent a cardiac catheterization procedure on Nov. 21, 2003.  Eight days after the procedure, Ramirez presented to the emergency department at the University of Illinois Hospital (UIC) complaining of groin pain.

The defendant, Dr. Joan Briller, was the attending cardiologist for the first 24 hours of her admission.  Dr. Briller and other physicians considered a retroperitoneal bleed in their assessment, but did not order a CT scan until about 22 hours later.

All parties agreed that a retroperitoneal bleed is a recognized complication of cardiac catheterization and often occurs in the absence of negligence.

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In May 2001, Michael Hamilton was a worker at the Behr Process Corp. plant in Chicago Heights, Ill., when he began experiencing severe pain.  He was taken by ambulance to St. James Hospital in Chicago Heights, Ill. 

At the hospital, Hamilton was met by Dr. Jose Almeida.  Within a few hours, Hamilton was discharged saying that his pain had ended.  He was instructed to see his primary care physician the next day.  However, the next day Hamilton was found dead in his mother’s apartment.  An autopsy revealed that Hamilton died of pericardia tamponade, which is blood surrounding the heart as a result of an aortic dissection.

The mother of Hamilton, Evelyn Hart, filed a lawsuit in Cook County claiming that the hospital, St. James and Dr. Almeida, as well as the doctor’s employer, Excel Emergency Care LLC, were negligent. 

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