Surgical Malpractice: An Overview and 5 Examples
Written by Cooper & Friedman PLLC on February 27, 2017
Any surgery – major or minor – comes with certain risks that are out of the control of the surgeon and team. Because of this, most patients sign a release form known as “informed consent” prior to going under the knife. This acknowledges they understand that surgery comes with certain risks that are out of anyone’s control.While the patient and surgeon consider and acknowledge surgical risks, surgical malpractice is unexpected and not accounted for. This is due to the fact that surgical malpractice occurs when the surgeon’s skills or decisions around treatment do not meet the established standard of care. When a patient is harmed or injured then surgical malpractice cases are fought.
There are a wide variety of reasons that surgical errors may occur. This includes: insufficient planning, incompetence, being under the influence, fatigue or neglect, improper communication, and finally, missed steps throughout surgery.
As personal injury attorneys we understand how serious cases of surgical malpractice can be. Follow along for five real examples of surgical malpractice that have occurred over the last 15 years to help you understand what surgical malpractice is, and if you may be an unknowing victim of such negligence.
5 Examples of Surgical Malpractice from Personal Injury Attorneys
Missed Steps Through The Surgical Process
- In October 2009 Nelson Bailey, a Palm Beach County, FL judge, had surgery for a bad case of diverticulitis. After going into surgery and coming out successfully, Bailey continued to deal with stomach pain for 5 months. His pain left doctors puzzled until the following March when he went back into the operating room. His medical team pulled a 12 inch by 12 inch surgical sponge out of his large intestine. The sponge – which had soaked up bile and other excrements – was rotting him from the inside out. This caused Bailey much more internal damage which ended with him having to get a portion of his intestines removed. This negligence falls under the label of missed steps throughout the work process as his surgical team did not follow the proper procedures to make sure all surgical material was cleaned up and removed from the patient before closing.
Medical Incompetence
- Blake Fought was going to leave the hospital the day that he died due to medical incompetence. Fought entered the hospital and got an IV line due to an unknown illness. The line placed in his neck gave him liquids and nutrition for his recovery. When it was time for the IV to be removed, the hospital sent an under-trained, under-qualified nurse. The nurse’s improper removal of the line led to the formation of an air bubble in Blake’s blood stream. The bubble travelled to his heart and he asphyxiated in front of his parents who’d arrived to take him home. The death of this man was solely due to the incompetence of the nurse sent to remove Fought’s central line.
Improper Communication
- Improper communication between the surgeon and his surgical team caused a man in Tampa, FL to have the wrong leg amputated during surgery in 1995. By the time the surgical team realized they were operating on, and removing, the wrong leg, it was too late for the process to be reversed. While the man was awarded a hefty sum of $900,000 dollars from the hospital for their staff’s mistakes, plus an additional quarter-of-a-million from the doctor personally, is there really a price that covers the cost of an accidentally lost limb?
Neglectful Error
- Neglect is a common issue throughout the medical field, including nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and hospitals. In 2003, a 17-year-old named Jessica Santilian visited the United States from Mexico to receive a triple organ transplant. Shortly after the transplant, Santilian suffered from major brain damage as her body started to shut down. “Stumped” as to why this was happening, doctors performed a second transplant, but Jessica passed on. It later came out that the doctors had neglected to double check the blood type of the organs Santilian was receiving. That one neglectful error caused her death.
Surgical Error
- A common instance of surgical error that results in medical malpractice lawsuits occurs when a patient finds they are awake during surgery. Anesthesia is distributed in two manners, one intravenously and the other through inhalation. Both drugs work in different ways; one paralyzes the patient temporarily to prevent movement during surgery while the other knocks the patient unconscious. This was not the case for Sherman Sizemore from West Virginia who went under the knife for an exploratory surgery to find the cause of his abdominal pain and was awake for the first 16 minutes of the operation. Sadly, Sizemore committed suicide due to lasting trauma from the experience only 2 weeks after the surgery. His family sought an allowance for grievance in court.
These cases are all extreme instances of surgical malpractice, but they are examples none the less. If you feel that you or a loved one has suffered under the hands of a surgeon, hospital, or medical doctor, then contact the attorneys at Cooper and Friedman of Louisville, KY today. Call 502-459-7555 to speak to a licensed attorney today. Cooper and Friedman has an A+ BBB Rating and they are proud members of the National Trial Lawyers Top 100 Trial Lawyers.