Justia Lawyer Rating for Robert D. Kreisman

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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 complications during the surgery, the doctors amputated Augutis’s right leg below the knee on Sept. 22, 2006. 

Augutis maintained that the amputation was the result of negligent treatment. He filed an administrative complaint with the Department of Veteran Affairs in July 2006. His claim was denied in September 2010 and Augutis filed a request for reconsideration in March 2011. 

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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 a stroke preventative measure since that time. Swallow also had a history of severe migraine headaches for which he was receiving treatment from the Diamond Headache Clinic. 

Dr. Moline told Swallow to stop taking aspirin before the planned surgery and cleared him for the surgery, which was done by Dr. Mitchell Sheinkop at Rush Oak Park Hospital on June 15, 2005.

After the hip surgery, Swallow suffered a severe embolic stroke the following day, June 16, 2005, which caused severe disability with inability to talk or care for himself.  He died on Sept. 11, 2009.

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There are more than 2,000 cases filed in the Actos Multidistrict Litigation (MDL) pending before a United States District Court judge in the Western District of Louisiana. The Actos MDL bellwether cases involve identifying two of the best plaintiff cases and a third case selected by the defendant Takeda Pharmaceuticals. Takeda is the manufacturer of Actos, which has been associated with bladder cancer. Actos is in a class of insulin-sensitizing drugs known as Thiazolidinediones, which was approved to treat Type II diabetes.

The Western District of Louisiana bellwether trials are scheduled to start Jan. 27, 2014;  a second will begin in April 2014.

There are about 3,000 cases pending in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Ill.  The bellwether process here is under way.  The cases in Chicago’s Circuit Court are being handled by Judge Deborah Dooling. 

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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, was called for a vascular consult later that afternoon. 

Because Sepulveda complained of chest pain, the hospitalist would not permit any additional surgery on the right leg until he had ruled out a heart attack. Dr. Iyer then had to wait to obtain surgical clearance.

The next afternoon, Nov. 10, 2009, Dr. Iyer received medical clearance to do the surgery but decided to postpone the vascular surgery until Nov. 13 because the patient’s condition had improved.The surgery was elective and Sepulveda had just eaten.  However, it was noted that on Nov. 11, 2009, Sepulveda’s condition had worsened, and she suffered a foot drop. Dr. Iyer performed an 8-hour revascularization procedure to repair the right popliteal artery that day. 

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A Cook County jury returned a verdict of $314,000 related to the death of John Alexander. Mr. Alexander was diagnosed with bladder cancer in 2002. A CT scan in 2006 showed evidence of a recurrence of the bladder cancer. The CT was ordered by the defendant internist, Philip Kiley, M.D.

Dr. Kiley had requested that his staff forward the CT report by fax to the patient’s treating urologist. In addition, Dr. Kiley claimed that he advised Mr. Alexander to return to the neurologist for further treatment. However, the fax was never sent, and the Alexander family claimed there was never any instruction to follow up with the urologist in 2006. 

Dr. Jerrold Seckler, the urologist, did not learn of the cancer recurrence until a year later. Even with the recurrence of the cancer, Dr. Seckler chose not inform Mr. Alexander and did not initiate any treatment.

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A recent count showed that more than 25,000 transvaginal mesh cases are pending in the Southern District of West Virginia.  These cases involve the vaginal mesh manufacturers C.R. Bard, Inc., American Medical Systems, Inc., Boston Scientific Corp., Ethicon, Inc., Coloplast Corp. and Cook Medical, Inc.

There are several thousand more cases pending in state court cases around the country, including the states of New Jersey, California, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Minnesota.  The first round of bellwether trials involving the transvaginal mesh manufacturers Bard, Boston Scientific and AMS are being scheduled in the Southern District of West Virginia. These cases will be tried in November 2013, as well as February and April 2014.  These will be the first of the bellwether trials involving these three defendants.

There have been other bellwether trials against the defendant C.R. Bard. In the first case, Cisson, et al. v. C.R. Bard, Inc., the jury returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff, Donna Cisson. In a second case involving C.R. Bard, a settlement was reached with the injured party.

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On Feb. 13, 2008, Richard Potrawski was taken by ambulance to Little Company of Mary Hospital in Evergreen Park, Ill., after suffering a head injury during a slip and fall on ice.  Mr. Potrawski was brought to the emergency room at 12:30 pm.  He had a large contusion above his right eye and a medical history of congestive heart failure as well as atrial fibrillation for which he was taking Coumadin, a blood thinner.

Mr. Potrawski had the potential for a brain bleed, but the defendant ER physician, Dr. Melissa Uribes ordered a CT scan which was done at 2:30 pm.  A scan revealed a 1-cm left-sided subdural hematoma.

Little Company of Mary Hospital did not have a neurosurgeon on staff, so Dr. Uribes took steps to find a hospital with neurosurgical services that would admit Mr. Potrawski. 

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Virginia Gettys was admitted to St. Joseph’s Hospital in Highland, Ill., with abdominal pain, abdominal distension and a report of bloody stools. This followed a recent colonoscopy. Gettys was admitted to the hospital on Jan. 14, 2004. 

The defendant, Dr. Jose Diaz, a general surgeon, performed an exploratory laparotomy to see the cause of Gettys’ symptoms. Dr. Diaz found nothing wrong. 

Gettys, 43, was transferred to another hospital where she died just four days later. She was survived by her husband and children.

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In a 9th Circuit decision handed down in January 2013, the court of appeals found that the Medical Device Amendments (MDA) to the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act were not a wedge to prevent a plaintiff from making a state negligence claim against Medtronic. In a series of previous cases dating back to 2008, defendants, manufacturers and distributors of medical devices were armed with preemption defenses as a result of the cases of Riegel v. Medtronic, Inc. and bolstered by Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly and Ashcroft v. Iqbal.  Because of the conflicts in the different U.S. Circuit Courts, there is a good possibility that the U.S. Supreme Court will take up these cases to clarify this litigation and rectify the conflict in the districts.

In the Stengel v. Medtronic case, the 9th Circuit held that the plaintiff’s claim of state law negligence for the defendant’s choosing not to report known risks of its product to the FDA, was not expressly nor impliedly preempted by the Medical Device Amendments to the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act.

In the Stengel case, Stengel had a Medtronic pump implanted in his abdomen to control pain he had in his back. Unfortunately, an inflammatory mass formed at the tip of the pump’s catheter that caused permanent paraplegia. 

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A confidential settlement was reached with a hospital emergency room and doctors after a 58-year-old man underwent emergency surgery. The man went to the hospital emergency room after dislocating his hip prosthesis. During the emergency surgery, the attending anesthesiologist attempted unsuccessfully to place an endotracheal tube. 

The man, Doe, required an emergency tracheotomy.

Doe suffered oxygen loss resulting in a hypoxia brain injury because of the lack of oxygen. After being removed from life support, Doe was transferred to hospice where he later died. Doe was survived by his wife and two adult children.

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