$1.5 Million Settlement for Delay in Treatment of Internal Bleeding

Attorneys Mark W. Tanner and Peter M. Newman secured a $1.5 million settlement for the surviving child of a 45-year-old man who died from delayed medical treatment in a hospital setting after he fell two stories from the exterior staircase of a building and sustained multiple internal injuries to organs and bones.

On his first day in the hospital, the patient was stabilized, and radiologic studies confirmed the absence of brain or spinal cord injuries. The patient was taken to the operating room where orthopedic injuries to his arm were successfully addressed. However, on day two in the hospital, the patient developed signs and symptoms of hemothorax, meaning that blood was collecting in his thoracic cavity. As hours passed without treatment, the patient’s condition declined, he required increasing doses of medication to constrict his blood vessels, and his neurological status also declined. When the patient was finally taken into the operating room, he suffered cardiac arrest on the table and other medical conditions that caused brain death.

A cardiovascular trauma surgeon retained by Tanner and Newman reviewed the treatment provided to the patient and concluded that there was a significant delay in taking the patient to the operating room to address the bleeding in the thorax and that the patient would otherwise have survived his trauma injuries.

The case was hotly contested by the defense, which argued that the patient’s fall had resulted in devastating multi-system injuries that were unavoidably fatal.