PUBLICATIONS

Donald Brown and Michael Dailey successfully defended a Lexington vascular surgeon from charges of medical negligence during a surgery to fix complications from a prior operation. The surgeon placed a catheter line to remedy the leaking bile, but the line also punctured the patient’s superior vena cava. The physician ordered an x-ray to confirm the line’s proper placement. Even though the x-ray indicated that the line was improperly placed, no one looked at the x-ray until after the patient had died of a build-up of fluid around the heart. The defense took up the position that the doctor had carried out his responsibility by simply ordering the x-ray, and that death could not be irrefutably correlated with surgery. The Fayette County jury agreed, returning a defense verdict on liability.

In this trial, a surgeon extracted a gall bladder, but inadvertently and unknowingly clipped the patient’s hepatic duct in the process. When the patient suffered complications afterwards, the problem was discovered and a second surgery fixed the problem. Plaintiff argued that this pointed to a violation of the surgeon standard of care. The defense, led by Gerald Toner, convinced the Shelby County jury that such a slight slip can and does happen to the best of hands, the jury awarding the Plaintiff nothing.

A Louisville psychiatrist advised a patient she would be a good candidate for an experimental drug. The woman, who had a history of bi-polar mania, improved during her time on the drug at the hospital, but when released complained of depression. Soon thereafter, the woman committed suicide. During trial, it was revealed that that the woman only started taking the real drug upon release from the hospital. The estate of the woman claimed mismanagement on part of the psychiatrist. The defense, led by Gerald Toner, convinced the jury that the double-blind study was appropriate, the woman’s mania was longstanding and progressively debilitating, and that it was this, not the psychiatrist’s care, that led to her suicide. The Jefferson County jury returned a verdict in favor of the doctor.

A Jefferson County jury found in favor of a Louisville neurosurgeon. The neurosurgeon performed a L3-L4 laminectomy on a patient, but afterwards the she suffered from cauda equina syndrome, where, because of spinal column compression, the woman lost feeling in the area on her body which would come into contact with a horse’s saddle. The Plaintiff now had diminished sexual, bladder, and bowel function and sought over 1.7 million dollars. Donald Brown and Joseph Klausing represented the neurosurgeon, and successfully argued that the woman’s condition was a recognized complication of the surgery and that the neurosurgeon upheld the reasonable neurosurgeon standard.

Christopher O’Bryan successfully defended a cardiologist from charges of medical malpractice in this Boyd County trial. A patient was diagnosed with unstable angina and underwent an uneventful cardiac catheterization procedure. Afterwards, the patient complained of groin pain, and it was discovered that a tamper tube that was supposed to be removed was left inside her groin. A second surgery took care of the matter, but the Plaintiff still sought reparations for pain and suffering. The defense argued that the use of the tamper tube was solely the responsibility of the nurses. The jury and defense agreed on this point, and the Plaintiff was awarded nothing.

A Boyd County jury found in a favor of an endocrinologist. During hospitalization for cardiac treatment, plaintiff had been placed on Amiodarone by her cardio-thoracic surgeon. Plaintiff alleged her dosage of Amiodarone was incorrect at discharge. Plaintiff alleged that the defendant, an endocrinologist, should have altered her cardiac medications. Plaintiff claimed to have suffered permanent damage, including partial blindness as a result of an Amiodarone overdose. Plaintiff sought millions of dollars for pain and suffering and future care. James Grohmann and Andie Camden successfully argued that the endocrinologist had not deviated from the accepted standard of care, and that the plaintiff’s medical complaints were not attributable to side effects of Amiodarone.

A Jefferson County jury found in favor of a Louisville plastic surgeon. After an abdominoplasty and liposuction, a patient developed necrosis of the tissue in her abdomen. The plastic surgeon fixed the problem, but the Plaintiff still complained of persistent pain. The Plaintiff blamed the result on the surgeon’s allegedly poor decision to conduct both the abdominoplasty and the liposuction at the same time. The physician, represented by Gerald Toner, successfully argued that the poor result of surgery was caused by a vascular compromise, a well-known complication of the surgery.

A Louisville surgeon performed an operation to inspect a suspicious lesion on a patient’s liver. Just minutes thereafter, the patient died. The estate of the Plaintiff alleged incompetence in deciding to perform the surgery in the first place, given the Plaintiff’s ominous medical history. On behalf of the physician, Donald Brown and Michael Dailey successfully argued that the surgery was warranted, properly performed, and that death was a tolerable risk. The Jefferson County jury ruled in favor of the surgeon.

A physician, attempting a lumbar epidural steroid injection, stuck a patient twelve times before switching to a fluoroscopy approach. Immediately following the injection, the patient was paralyzed from the waist down, a common effect following an epidural. The doctor loosely monitored the patient throughout the day, and, when the paralysis persisted, sent the patient to the ER. There, a CT scan and MRI were taken, indicating spinal cord compression that would leave the patient permanently paralyzed. The Plaintiff alleged the anesthesiologist’s twelve sticks brought about the paralysis and if the physician had kept better watch over the patient, then steroids could have been administered to relieve the condition. Leading the defense, Gerald Toner argued that the paralysis was not brought about by the twelve sticks, but by an immediate segmental arterial infarction, and that no amount of subsequent care could have reversed the paralysis. A Jefferson County jury agreed with the defense, returning a verdict in favor of the anesthesiologist, and awarding the Plaintiff none of asked-for $5,000,000 in damages.

In this fraud case, David Strite and Mark Hammond represented a university student who attended a radiographic technical college in Louisville thinking the courses were part of an accredited program. When the student discovered the college was not accredited, the student took action, seeking lost wages and punitive damages from the falsely-advertising college. Despite university efforts to deny any fraudulent misrepresentation, the jury found in favor of the student, awarding him $105,540.

A Jefferson County jury found in favor of a Louisville orthopedic doctor in this medical malpractice case. A woman underwent a hip replacement surgery, after which her right leg was eight millimeters shorter that the right. This, claimed the Plaintiff, caused undue pain and suffering and lost wages, and could have been prevented had the surgeon taken into account the patient’s pelvic tilt and preexisting scoliosis. The defense, led by Donald Brown, successfully argued that the orthopedist’s technical skill during surgery was excellent, that the patient’s ill-advised pursuit of further surgical intervention only exacerbated the patient’s problems, and that it was this unnecessary surgery, not the defendant’s actions, which caused the bulk of the trouble.

A Hardin County jury found in favor of an Ob-Gyn after a patient died of complications following a vaginal hysterectomy. The woman died of a pulmonary embolus, and the Plaintiff alleged negligence in the Ob-Gyn’s failure to administer the prophylactic drug Heparin to reduce the risk of an embolus. The defense, led by Tracy Prewitt, successfully argued that the physician’s use of a pneumatic compression cuff was a satisfactory option, and thus the doctor upheld the competent standard of care.

A Boyd County Ob-Gyn delivered a baby, and all seemed routine until shortly thereafter the mother began to lose blood. The patient sustained an inverted uterus, and the doctor, after numerous attempts to manually and surgically turn the uterus right, decided to perform an emergency hysterectomy. The Plaintiff sought over $2,000,000 dollars in reparations, arguing that the Ob-Gyn should have discontinued a uterine relaxing drug before administering contraction medication. Tracy Prewitt represented the physician, positing that it was the doctor’s swift decision to perform the hysterectomy that saved the patient’s life. The Boyd County jury concurred, awarding the Plaintiff nothing.

After undergoing a gastric bypass surgery, a patient soon noticed abdominal pain. An x-ray and CT scan revealed that a surgical sponge had been left inside her abdomen, and an infection followed. The physician, at the time of the surgery, had known the sponge count was off and therefore took multiple x-rays, all of which reported no sponge. This was sufficient evidence to convince him that the nurses had simply miscounted. Though the Plaintiff charged the doctor with undue negligence, the defense argued that the doctor’s assumption of a miscount was reasonable given the facts. James Grohmann argued on behalf of the physician, and a federal jury in Louisville returned a defense verdict for the surgeon.

A Louisville ER neurologist was awarded a defense verdict by a Jefferson County jury. The case involved a fatal cerebral stroke hours after a deadly car wreck. The Plaintiff alleged that the physician failed to administer the coagulant-preventive drug Heparin which would have prevented the stroke. James Grohmann successfully defended the neurologist, arguing that the standard of care was met and that the Heparin’s administration, given the rarity of the carotid artery dissection condition, was not obviously appropriate at the time since the trauma care came first. Furthermore, the defense showed that there was no evidence that had Heparin been used, the result would have been any different. The estate of the patient sought over $3,000,000 in reparations, but the defense judgment awarded the Plaintiff nothing.