Oregon patients may be appalled to see that in a lawsuit, a 60-year-old woman claims that surgeons at Yale-New Haven Medical Center botched her May 2015 surgery. She went in to have part of a cancerous rib removed, but surgeons operated on the wrong rib. The lawsuit says that the doctors lied to her in an effort to cover for their mistake, and she was rushed back into surgery that same day.
The women’s attorney said that the rib that was supposed to be operated on was clearly marked. Prior to surgery, metallic coils and a dye was inserted near the eighth rib, where the woman had a potentially cancerous legion. Therefore, the attorney claimed that failure to operate on the correct rib was an example of negligence. Instead of operating on the eighth rib, surgeons operated on the seventh rib. However, the woman was told that not enough rib had been removed as the reason why she was going back into surgery.
Yale University School of Medicine the woman’s lead doctor were named as defendants in the lawsuit. A surgical trainee who was added to the team without the woman’s knowledge was also named. The suit claims that the woman suffered serious and permanent injuries because of the errors made during surgery. Legal counsel for the woman did say that a lawsuit could have been avoided by simply acknowledging the mistake when it happened.
When surgical mistakes are made, patients could suffer injuries that may require a lengthy recovery period and additional medical expenses. A medical malpractice attorney can often review the patient’s hospital records to identify the party or parties that should be held financially responsible for the patient’s losses.