Representative Medical Malpractice Victories

K.B. v. Kim – $30,000,000 jury verdict for a six-year-old girl who suffered cerebral palsy due to a delayed emergency cesarean section delivery.

J.G. v. Advocate Christ Medical Center – $12,261,171 jury verdict for the estate of a 49-year-old man who died from a rare blood disease, thrombotic thrombocytopenia purpura (TTP). He was admitted to the hospital on a Sunday morning, the diagnosis was confirmed by 4:30 p.m., but the plasmapheresis nurse took 6 hours to come to the hospital to provide the essential emergency treatment. His wife and three adult children survive him. The judgment was affirmed by the First District Appellate Court and was paid in full with interest.

D.B. v. Advocate Medical Group S.C. – $10,500,000 jury verdict for a 72-year-old woman who suffered an above knee amputation of her leg due to a failure of the emergency room doctor to diagnose bacterial cellulitis. The jury award included $10,000,000 for non-economic losses.

A.T., a minor v. a Chicago suburban hospital – $13,000,000 settlement for a 3-year-old girl who received brain injuries as a result of negligent care during an open-heart surgery. The girl was undergoing treatment to relieve aortic stenosis. When she was on heart-lung bypass, she became ischemic. The perfusionists wanted to immediately transfuse her with packed red blood cells but the blood units for this child were not in the OR refrigerator as they should have been. It took more than thirty minutes for the blood to be delivered to the OR and as a result, the girl suffered hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy. The hospital paid $12,000,000 and the perfusion contracting company paid its $1,000,000 policy limits.

S.D., a minor v. Advocate Christ Hospital and Medical Center – $9,900,000 settlement for a 7-year-old boy who suffered brain injuries when he arrested due to post-surgical neglect.

A.O. v. Edgewater Medical Center – $9,346,663 jury verdict for the estate of a 42-year-old man who died because of an unnecessary cardiac catheterization performed negligently. The jury’s award included $8,350,000 for loss of society.

H.P. v. Hermann­ – $9,350,000 settlement for a 42 year-old man who suffered a brain injury during surgery to remove a brain tumor (meningioma).

M.R. v. ASSH – $8,000,000 settlement for the surviving husband and adult children of a 52-year-old woman who died when an anesthesiologist was unable to intubate her before an elective surgery. During trial preparations, the anesthesiologist admitted that he created an inaccurate and untrue anesthesia record of the events. He was later removed from the hospital staff as a result of that testimony.

J.F., a minor v. Loyola University Physicians’ Group – $7,900,000 settlement for a child with cerebral palsy due to a physician’s neglect in delaying delivery. The case was settled within six months of filing, greatly reducing lawyers’ expenses and fees.

J.H., a minor v. University of Chicago Hospitals– $7,250,000 settlement for a seven-year-old brain damaged girl. She suffered an anoxic arrest in the emergency room after 7 hours of medical care that did not properly treat her sickle cell crisis.

I.S. v. Fajardo – Represented an infant who suffered brain damage as the result of anesthesiology malpractice. The child was rendered comatose by the malpractice, and he survived on a ventilator for seven years. Case settled for $6,200,000, a record malpractice settlement in Illinois in 1985.

Estate of K.S. v. Methodist Medical Center of Illinois et al. – $5,008,921.72 jury verdict for the estate of a 36-year-old woman who hemorrhaged to death in an operating room after a DaVinci robotic hysterectomy surgery. The jury found the gynecologist and the anesthesiologist negligently caused the death. She is survived by three children and her husband from whom she separated 10 months earlier. The previous high wrongful death verdict in Tazewell County where this case was tried was $970,000.

U.P. v. Northwest Community Hospital, Nephrology Associates of Northern Illinois – Our client was a 61-year-old woman admitted to treat lethargy and balance problems. Hyponatremia (low serum sodium) was diagnosed. The defendants overdosed her on 3% sodium solution and she suffered pontine myelinolysis, a brain injury. The case settled for $5,000,000.

R.M., a minor v. Children’s Memorial Hospital – $3,000,000 settlement for an adolescent boy who sustained a brain injury due to an overdose of Phenobarbital given to him when he was a newborn.

Estate of T.S. v. Rush University Medical Center – Our client was a 74-year-old man with severe heart disease. He consented to participate in a clinical trial that involved injecting the inside wall of the left ventricle of his heart with stem cells to regenerate heart muscle. The doctor, using a medical device approved by the FDA only for investigational uses, perforated the wall of the heart and lacerated a cardiac vein. This led to cardiac tamponade that another cardiologist employed by Rush University tried to repair. Those efforts led to a significant laceration of the heart wall, a hematoma, and our client’s death. The suit against Rush, the doctors’ employer, the medical device manufacturer, and the clinical trial sponsor was settled for $2,800,000.

Estate of B.C. v. Raj – $1,800,000 settlement to the surviving parents and half- brother of a nineteen-month-old child who died at Lutheran General Hospital. Bryce had hydrocephalus, and was being treated with an external ventricular drain to reduce the amount of cerebrospinal fluid in his brain. The drain malfunctioned, and despite adverse neurological signs and symptoms over the course of 20 hours, it was not replaced by the attending neurosurgeon. As a result, he suffered cardio-respiratory arrest and died.

John Anonymous v. Northwestern Faculty Foundation – $1,000,000 settlement in the Sperm Thaw cases for a 35-year-old man whose cryogenically preserved sperm samples were accidently thawed and destroyed by Northwestern. It is the highest reported settlement in Illinois of a sperm loss case.