Expert Witness Case #20
Mr. S is a middle aged man who developed several lipomas on his back.
He was seen by a general surgeon and a surgery was scheduled to remove the largest lipoma.
The morning of the surgeon, Dr. A marked the lipoma with his name.
However, when the patient woke up, a different lipoma had been removed.
The patient also had difficulty with urinary retention following the surgery.
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The patient hired an attorney to sue the doctor.
The expert witness opinion for the plaintiff is shown below:
The lawsuit was filed in June 2015. It was ultimately dismissed by the court in May 2019 after 6 months of inactivity.
MedMalReviewer Opinion:
1) The alleged harm in this case is far less than in most medical malpractice lawsuits. I certainly don’t think this case would have settled for any significant amount. It would be difficult to convince a jury that the patient should be awarded significant damages. These types of situations are best resolved when the hospital agrees not to bill the patient.
2) The lawyer representing the plaintiff seems very inexperienced with medical malpractice lawsuits. Not only was he unlikely to be reimbursed for his work, he completely abandoned the lawsuit. Rather than withdrawing the lawsuit, it was simply ignored until the judge dismissed it.
There are law firms that specialize in medical malpractice. For better or worse, they are very efficient at finding cases with the potential for large damages. They have what amounts to a legal assembly line and can pump out lawsuit after lawsuit. You likely have one of these firms in your area; if you aren’t sure who it is, your hospital attorney probably knows.