Jury awards man $1.5 million in medical malpractice suit

An out-of-state jury recently returned a $1.5 million verdict in a medical malpractice lawsuit. An out-of-state carpenter as well as his wife were the plaintiffs. The man’s health was severely affected after a resident working at an medical center failed to properly diagnose him. When medical malpractice like this occurs, Pennsylvania residents are entitled to file a claim for damages against the party or parties believed to have acted or performed their duties negligently.

The 56-year-old man no longer has the use of his left hand and, additionally, suffered what is believed to be permanent damage to the rest of his left arm. The man was not properly diagnosed in Feb. 2011. He had been airlifted to the hospital on Feb. 2, 2011 due to falling around 16 feet from some scaffolding. He on concrete located at the worksite of a boat building company.

The man was experiencing significant pain in that arm, yet no medical professional saw him for more than six hours on Feb. 3, 2011. His wife asked for hours — without success — for a doctor to examine the man. According to court documents, the man developed compartment syndrome, which occurs when muscles, blood vessels and nerves are compressed by swelling in a specific compartment of the body — in this case, the man’s left arm.

As a result, the blood vessels in his arm could not deliver oxygen, which caused the destruction of both nerves as well as muscles when left untreated for over six hours. He later underwent a number of surgeries, but the only result is a useless and deformed limb, according to the man’s complaint. In this case, the man had a valid medical malpractice case and, like other Pennsylvania residents in similar situations, decided to enlist the help of an experienced medical malpractice attorney to help him prepare and present his claim before a jury in civil court.