Plaintiff filed suit against the United States in a federal district court alleging that medical staff at the VA medical center in Salt Lake City negligently caused his son’s death. The district court certified two questions to the Utah Supreme Court asking whether the noneconomic damages cap in section 78B-3-410 of the Malpractice Act permissible as applied to wrongful death cases under Utah Const. art. XVI, 5, which prohibits damage caps in wrongful death cases. The Supreme Court held that the damages cap in section 78B-3-410 is unconstitutional as applied to cases of wrongful death under article XVI, section 5 of the Utah Constitution. View "Smith v. United States" on Justia Law

In 2003, Kristy Orlowski, who was twenty-two years old and thirty-six weeks pregnant, was found unresponsive in her home by a family member. Less than twenty-four hours earlier, Orlowski had been seen by her prenatal care physician, Dr. Norman Taylor, to whom she complained of headaches, dizziness, nausea, and swelling of her hands and feet, all of which were symptoms of pre-eclampsia. Despite Orlowski's reported symptoms, Dr. Taylor failed to diagnose Orlowski's pre-eclampsia and sent her home from her doctor's visit without any special instructions or warnings. The Supreme Court granted a writ of certiorari to review the court of appeals' decision in which the court of appeals affirmed as modified the dismissal of this action, which was the second medical malpractice case filed by a conservator on behalf of Orlowski. The first medical malpractice action was filed in August 2006 against a different physician. When the trial of that action resulted in a defense verdict, Petitioner Gladys Sims filed this action on Orlowski's behalf seeking the same damages against different defendants, Respondents, Dr. Edward Creagh and Amisub of South Carolina, Inc., d/b/a Piedmont Medical Center ("Piedmont"). Respondents moved for summary judgment, asserting Petitioner's claim was barred by the statute of limitations. Petitioner contended her suit was timely filed because the three-year medical malpractice statute of limitations in section 15-3-545 of the South Carolina Code was subject to the tolling provision for insanity in section 15-3-40. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Respondents. Upon review, the Supreme Court found the court of appeals properly construed section 15-3-545 in rejecting Petitioner's reliance on section 15-3-40 in arguing for an eight-year statute of limitations, and accordingly, affirmed. View "Sims v. Amisub of SC" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs brought this medical malpractice action against Defendant, a medical doctor, for the wrongful death of their deceased father. A jury found that Defendant breached the standard of care and that this breach was the proximate cause of the death of Plaintiffs’ father. The jury awarded Plaintiff more than $3 million in general damages and $300,000 in punitive damages. The Supreme Court reversed and remanded for a new jury trial, holding that the trial court abused its discretion in admitting evidence of Defendant’s prior felony conviction under rules 608 and 609 of the Utah Rules of Evidence, and the admission of Defendant’s conviction was not harmless error. View "Robinson v. Taylor" on Justia Law

On December 24, 2009, inmate Conley’s hand was examined by a prison nurse, who described Conley’s symptoms to Dr. Birch over the phone; throbbing pain, severe swelling, discoloration, and loss of function throughout the entire hand. The nurse concluded in his treatment notes that Conley suffered from a “possible/probable fracture.” Dr. Birch ordered a regimen of ibuprofen and ice but did not order an x-ray until almost five days later. The x-ray revealed that Conley’s hand was fractured, and years later, he continues to suffer from chronic pain and limited mobility. In 2011, Conley brought suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs in the days following his injury. The Seventh Circuit reversed summary judgment in favor of Dr. Birch, stating that a reasonable jury could find that, based on the information conveyed to her in her December 24 telephone conversation, Dr. Birch strongly suspected that Conley’s hand was fractured. Dr. Birch’s uncontroverted testimony was sufficient to permit a jury to conclude that, by declining to order an x-ray of Conley’s hand at such a crucial point in the healing process, she exacerbated his lasting injuries. View "Conley v. Birch" on Justia Law

In 2009, Plaintiff Barry White went to Memorial Hospital at Gulfport's emergency room complaining of slurred speech and left-sided numbness. White told the nurses there he thought he was having a stroke. He was diagnosed with hypertension, given medicine and sent home. He returned the next day, and after testing, White was diagnosed with having had a completed stroke. White underwent a battery of outpatient occupational therapy, speech therapy and physical therapy. White then brought a medical negligence lawsuit against Memorial Hospital regarding the alleged misdiagnosis and won at trial. On appeal, the hospital challenged White's expert witnesses' testimony, claiming they failed to provide medical literature to support their opinions. After review, the Supreme Court concluded the experts were not required to provide medical literature to support their opinions, and affirmed. View "Memorial Hospital at Gulfport v. White" on Justia Law

Illinois prisoner Petties was climbing stairs when he felt a “pop” and extreme pain in his left ankle. At the prison infirmary, the examining physician prescribed Vicodin and crutches and a week of “meals lay-in.” The medical director, Dr. Carter, noted in the file that Petties had suffered an “Achilles tendon rupture” and modified the instructions, directing that Petties be scheduled for an MRI and examination by an orthopedist as an “urgent” matter. Prison lockdowns resulted in cancelation of three appointments. Eight weeks passed before he received an orthopedic boot. Petties claimed that more than a year later, he still experienced “serious pain, soreness, and stiffness” in his ankle. Petties argued that Carter was deliberately indifferent by failing to immobilize his ankle with a boot or cast immediately and that a physician he saw later was deliberately indifference in not ordering physical therapy despite a recommendation. The court granted the doctors summary judgment, reasoning that waiting before immobilizing Petties’s ankle could not have constituted deliberate indifference because several physicians held different opinions and that a jury could not reasonably find that rejection of the recommendation for physical therapy constituted deliberate indifference. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. A jury could not reasonably find that the treatment of Petties’s ankle rose to the level of a constitutional violation. View "Petties v. Carter" on Justia Law

In 2007, plaintiff Lisa Tyra received a kidney transplant at defendant William Beaumont Hospital, with a kidney made available by defendant Organ Procurement Agency of Michigan. Plaintiff allegedly suffered complications because the kidney did not constitute a proper match, and she filed suit asserting defendants should have identified this fact before the surgery. When plaintiff filed her complaint, the 182-day notice period set forth in MCL 600.2912b(1) had not yet expired. Organ Procurement moved for summary disposition on the basis that plaintiff’s complaint was filed prematurely, and the period of limitations had since expired. The hospital and Dr. Steven Cohn, the transplant surgeon, joined the motion and the trial court later granted the motion. The trial court reasoned that, under "Burton v Reed City Hosp Corp," (691 NW2d 424 (2005)), the prematurely filed complaint failed to toll the running of the period of limitations and plaintiff could not cure the error by refiling the complaint. The legal issue before the Supreme Court in this case was whether the controlling caselaw authority governing this case, "Zwiers v Growney," (778 NW2d 81 (2009)), was overruled by the Michigan Supreme Court in "Driver v Naini," (802 NW2d 311 (2011)). The Court of Appeals held that Zwiers was not overruled in Driver. Because the Supreme Court concluded to the contrary, it reversed the judgment of the Court of Appeals in part in both "Tyra v Organ Procurement Agency of Mich," (850 NW2d 667 (2013)), and "Furr v McLeod," (848 NW2d 465 (2014)). In "Tyra," the Court reinstated the trial court’s order granting defendants’ motion for summary disposition, and in "Furr," the Court remanded the case back to the trial court for entry of an order granting defendants’ motion for summary disposition. View "Tyra v. Organ Procurement Agency of Michigan" on Justia Law

Respondent filed a medical negligence lawsuit alleging that Appellants negligently failed to timely drain Respondent’s prostate abscess, causing the abscess to rupture. After a trial, the jury returned a verdict in Respondent’s favor. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) Appellants did not preserve for review their argument that the trial court erred in admitting into evidence certain videotaped deposition testimony; (2) the trial court did not err in failing to find that the verdict was excessive due to jury passion and prejudice or because it exceeded fair and reasonable compensation for Respondent’s injuries; and (3) the Court will not address Appellants’ constitutional challenge to Mo. Rev. Stat. 538.300, which prohibits defendants in medical negligence cases from seeking remittitur, because the statutory prohibition in section 538.300 was not implicated in this case. View "Stewart v. Partamian" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented for the Georgia Supreme Court's review centered on a question about the qualification of expert witnesses under OCGA 24-7-702 (“Rule 702”). Specifically, the issue reduced to what sort of experience was required of a practicing surgeon who was offered as an expert witness in a medical malpractice case to opine that another surgeon breached the applicable standard of medical care in the course of performing a surgical procedure. In this case, the Court of Appeals held that a surgeon was not qualified as a matter of law under Rule 702 (c)(2)(A) to give expert testimony about negligence in connection with a laparoscopic procedure to repair an umbilical hernia because he had not performed more than one laparoscopic procedure to repair an umbilical hernia in the last five years, notwithstanding that the surgeon had performed many other abdominal laparoscopic procedures during that time. The Supreme Court issued a writ of certiorari to consider whether the Court of Appeals understood Rule 702 (c)(2)(A) correctly, and concluded that it did not. Accordingly, the Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the Court of Appeals. View "Dubois v. Brantley" on Justia Law

A cardiologist performed pacemaker surgery on Gregory Hagen and then ordered an x-ray to check the placement of the pacemaker leads and for complications. A second cardiologist reviewed the x-ray and discharged Hagen from the hospital. A radiologist also reviewed the x-ray, noted a potential “nodule” in Hagen's lung, and recommended follow-up x-rays. But these recommendations were never relayed to Hagen, who died from lung cancer approximately two years later. Hagen's wife Shirley filed a medical negligence suit against the two cardiologists, alleging that their failure to relay the radiologist’s recommendations resulted in a lost chance of survival for Gregory. The superior court granted summary judgment to the cardiologists on the grounds that expert testimony from a board-certified cardiologist was required to establish the standard of care and that the Estate had failed to identify such an expert. On appeal of that order, the Estate argued there was a genuine issue of material fact whether the cardiologist who ordered the x-ray later received the radiologist’s report. After review, the Supreme Court concluded the Estate did not show how this issue was material to the superior court’s decision regarding the necessity of expert testimony to establish the standard of care. Accordingly, the Court affirmed. View "Hagen v. Strobel" on Justia Law