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A New Jersey woman has sued her orthopedic surgeon after awakening from surgery to find a temporary tattoo below her panty line. Elizabeth Mateo, of Camden County, N.J., filed her lawsuit Tuesday saying she found "a temporary tattoo of a red rose" below her panty line the morning after her surgery for a herniated disc, her attorney, Gregg A. Shivers, told the Philadelphia Inquirer. "She was extremely emotionally upset by it," Shivers told the paper.

AMY FLEDDERMAN's case was never going to be settled out of court, her parents say, because it was never about money. Daniel and Colleen Fledderman, of Newtown Square, Delaware County, decided in 2001 that the doctor who performed the fatal liposuction surgery on their daughter, an 18-year-old Penn State freshman, must be held accountable for her death. And they wanted to warn the public about Dr. Richard Glunk, who they say refused to call an ambulance before it was too late to save her life. Glunk, a board-certified plastic surgeon who has been practicing for 21 years, insists that Fledderman...

snip- For decades, malpractice lawyers and insurers have counseled doctors and hospitals to “deny and defend.” Many still warn clients that any admission of fault, or even expression of regret, is likely to invite litigation and imperil careers. But with providers choking on malpractice costs and consumers demanding action against medical errors, a handful of prominent academic medical centers, like Johns Hopkins and Stanford, are trying a disarming approach. By promptly disclosing medical errors and offering earnest apologies and fair compensation, they hope to restore integrity to dealings with patients, make it easier to learn from mistakes and dilute anger...

-- snip --In 2003 and in 2005, Texas enacted a series of reforms to the state's civil justice system. They are stunning in their success. Texas Medical Liability Trust, one of the largest malpractice insurance companies in the state, has slashed its premiums by 35%, saving doctors some $217 million over four years. There is also a competitive malpractice insurance industry in Texas, with over 30 companies competing for business. This is driving rates down...

CDC Says Problems with Hepatitis C at Clinic Could Be 'Tip of an Iceberg' Posted: 11:10 AM Mar 4, 2008 Last Updated: 2:44 PM Mar 4, 2008 Washington (AP) The head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says an outbreak of Hepatitis C at a Nevada clinic may represent “the tip of an iceberg” of safety problems at clinics around the country. The City of Las Vegas shut down the Endoscopy center of Southern Nevada last Friday after state health officials determined that six patients had contracted Hepatitis C because of unsafe practices including clinic staff reusing syringes...

A Toms River pediatrician under investigation for firing a gun in his office surrendered his license to practice medicine while authorities yesterday detailed the serious allegations against him. At its regularly scheduled meeting yesterday in Trenton, the state Board of Medical Examiners approved a consent agreement with Jose Romillo to take his license pending the outcome of the investigation, said Larry DeMarzo, acting director of the state Division of Consumer Affairs. Romillo, who obtained his medical license in 1976, was charged Dec. 31 with firing a handgun sometime in October. From that investigation, state and Ocean County health officials determined...

"Paulo Melo, 29, has been in a coma at the Royal Darwin Hospital for two weeks, after severing his spinal cord in a car crash." - read more below: doctor requested, family objected, court granted

HOUSTON, Oct. 4 — In Texas, it can be a long wait for a doctor: up to six months. That is not for an appointment. That is the time it can take the Texas Medical Board to process applications to practice. Four years after Texas voters approved a constitutional amendment limiting awards in medical malpractice lawsuits, doctors are responding as supporters predicted, arriving from all parts of the country to swell the ranks of specialists at Texas hospitals and bring professional health care to some long-underserved rural areas.

Darrie Eason, a 35-year-old single mother from Long Island, N.Y., underwent a double mastectomy after she was told she had breast cancer. But after the surgery, she learned the unthinkable -- she never had cancer at all. "I remember the words, 'You don't have breast cancer, you never did,'" Eason said today on "Good Morning America." The news was stunning. "I have a philosophy that you have to laugh to keep from crying, so I try to laugh as much as I can," Eason said. A state report blames Eason's mix-up on a former technician at CBLPath lab who mislabeled...

Claiming that Planned Parenthood negligently misdiagnosed her cervical cancer for more than a year, former Planned Parenthood patient Rebecca Glover has filed a medical malpractice suit seeking at least $2 million in damages. Glover’s lawsuit alleges that, after performing a Pap smear, Planned Parenthood of San Diego and Riverside Counties failed to tell her the result: that the test revealed she had cervical cancer. snip Glover’s lawsuit is the second filed against Planned Parenthood of San Diego and Riverside Counties in a month. On June 19, the mother of 21-year-old Edrica Goode of Riverside filed suit against Planned Parenthood after...

The mother of a San Luis Obispo man who died after an attempted organ donation at Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center last year claims she never gave hospital officials consent to take her son off life-support and was misinformed when agreeing to the organ harvest, according to a wrongful death lawsuit. Rosa Navarro also alleges in her June 29 civil lawsuit that a transplant surgeon misrepresented himself as her son’s doctor, an allegation the surgeon’s attorney strongly denies. She also said she agreed to the organ donation only because she believed her son had no chance of survival. Defendants in...

(AP) LOS ANGELES 911 tapes reveal callers pleading for help for a woman who lay bleeding on the emergency room floor of an inner-city LA hospital, but they are referred to hospital staff instead.

Los Angeles (AP) -- Federal health officials threatened to cut funding to a troubled hospital after determining it jeopardized the lives of its emergency room patients. Inspectors said Thursday that Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital, formerly known as King/Drew, has 23 days to resolve its problems or it would lose its federal funding. They also noted even if the issues are dealt with, the hospital could lose its federal certification because it didn't meet the terms of an agreement with the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The deal called for the hospital to adhere to Medicare's basic standards....

Ten years ago, 19 hospitals in Philadelphia were in the business of delivering babies. Next month, only eight will remain

John Edwards vs. Babies and Moms By Michael Fumento The American Spectator, March 21, 2007 Copyright 2007 The American Spectator John Edwards, being neither a woman nor a racial minority, isn't doing especially well in his campaign to become the Democratic Party's candidate for the U.S. presidency. Alas for him, if he were half as successful in campaigning for America's top job as he was as a trial lawyer, he might be sworn in tomorrow. Edwards won at least 94 cases, according to Lawyers Weekly, of which 54 netted more than $1 million each. Normally attorneys take a 40 percent...

Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer is blasting a new mailer sent to voters by Tan Nguyen, the embattled Orange County congressional candidate linked to a "voter intimidation" letter sent to Latinos. Lockyer's office has been investigating the source of the original letter, which warned "emigrado" not to vote Tuesday. Nguyen supporters said the word refers simply to an immigrant, without connoting legal status, while others said the mailer clearly was an attempt to suppress Latino voter turnout. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called the mailer "racist" and a "hate crime." The new Nguyen mailer, which just landed in the district, claims that Lockyer...

While Texas plaintiffs lawyers have been leaving in droves from nursing-home and medical-malpractice litigation in the wake of tort reform, San Antonio’s Glenn Cunningham is still doing it—albeit with a radically different business model and a much thinner wallet. Before the 2003 changes in state law, Cunningham would round up seven or eight experts, take 15 to 20 depositions and easily spend $85,000 to $100,000 to work up a case. Apparently, the effort persuaded defendants they had problems on the facts and the law, because he often settled for $1 million to $3 million. But with new restrictions on medical-malpractice...

(Vanity) FReepers- I need the name of several great books on how to sue your attorney. Basically,this whole ordeal has been going on for 4 1/2 years and my attorney has just continued to negate his fudiciary responsibilty in so many ways and left me with no choice. My dealings with him are regarding the selling of some companies and some real estate holdings. He and the accountant who did the valuations are a little too close for comfort and now my valuations have been held hostage (even though the accountant has been paid in full over a YEAR AGO!!...

I remember him coming rushing in from the garden that afternoon, in tears and covered in blood. After running his finger under the tap and seeing how deep the gash was, I decided to take him to our local A&E department at the King George hospital in Goodmayes, Essex. Tony cried all the way there but soon perked up at the sight of the hospital and the doctors. Because his wound was bleeding so heavily, we were rushed straight through to see a doctor and Tony was given a painkilling injection. When the doctors said they wanted to transfer Tony...

Pollard Rogers figures that for years, the Cantey & Hanger law firm in Fort Worth has had one of the largest medical malpractice defense practices in North Texas. And it probably still does. But it's nowhere near as big as it was before the state changed the tort system three years ago, said Rogers, the firm's managing partner. The Medical Malpractice and Tort Reform Act of 2003 put caps on noneconomic (pain and suffering) damages that could be awarded and raised the standard of proof necessary to win a malpractice case against an emergency healthcare provider. There is no cap...

The father of a disabled woman who died last year is entitled to half her estate even though he had little contact with her during her life, a state judge ruled yesterday. Ruben Martinez of Staten Island will receive about $400,000 of the $1.1 million remaining in a trust established for the care of his daughter, Jennifer Rogiers, who was born with severe disabilities caused by spinal cord injury suffered during her breech birth in 1983. The girl's mother, Rosa Rogiers of Weehawken, also received $400,000 and an additional $300,000 to compensate her for the years of care she provided...

Stamford, Conn. -- In what attorneys say is the first case of its kind since Connecticut legalized civil unions, a lesbian couple filed a medical malpractice lawsuit Tuesday claiming botched cancer treatments damaged their love life. Margaret Mueller and Charlotte Stacey are accusing two doctors of treating Mueller for ovarian cancer when she actually had cancer of the appendix. They contend Mueller underwent years of grueling chemotherapy while the cancer spread. Married couples in personal injury cases commonly sue over damage to their love lives, or what is known as loss of consortium. Joshua Koskoff, an attorney for the lesbian...

About 40 percent of the medical malpractice cases filed in the United States are groundless, according to a Harvard analysis of the hotly debated issue that pits trial lawyers against doctors, with lawmakers in the middle. Many of the lawsuits analyzed contained no evidence that a medical error was committed or that the patient suffered any injury, the researchers reported. The vast majority of those dubious cases were dismissed with no payout to the patient. However, groundless lawsuits still accounted for 15 percent of the money paid out in settlements or verdicts. The study's lead researcher, David Studdert of the...

First, lets describe the health care problems we have in Pennsylvania. Perhaps the most alarming fact is that Pennsylvania is losing 1,500 doctors each year due to the skyrocketing cost of malpractice insurance premiums. One local family doctor, who had never been sued, related how his premium went from $75,000 per year to $150,000 per year in one jump. His premium would be $12,000 if his practice were in Virginia. The next issue is the closure of hospitals. In the 166th District, our only hospital - Mercy Haverford - closed its doors in 2002, and has not reopened.

Here's what I believe to be true regarding some of the most important issues facing America today, and what most politicians apparently don't. IMMIGRATION LAW ENFORCEMENT I'm going to be as blunt as I can be with respect to the illegal alien problem in this country, while refraining from using the profane terms that routinely leap to my mind every time I think about our government's unrelenting failure to address this issue in any responsible way. To get right to the point, any person in this country who doesn't support (A) doing whatever is necessary to stop illegals from entering...

SENATE, No. 2910 STATE OF NEW JERSEY 211th LEGISLATURE INTRODUCED DECEMBER 5, 2005 Sponsored by: Senator THOMAS H. KEAN, JR. District 21 (Essex, Morris, Somerset and Union) SYNOPSIS Establishes a Medical Malpractice Court. CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT As introduced. AN ACT establishing a Medical Malpractice Court and supplementing Title 2B of the New Jersey Statutes. BE IT ENACTED by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey: 1. The Legislature of the State of New Jersey finds and declares that: a. The resolution of disputes in cases involving medical malpractice issues should be improved to assure litigants...

Nov. 10, 2005 — In recent years many doctors and politicians have complained that frivolous malpractice lawsuits and disproportionate jury awards are a problem in need of reform. But when "Primetime" did some investigating, it turned out that at least some of the people in favor of reform — even some of its loudest proponents — have themselves benefited from the current laws. The Senator's Wife Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., says that the No. 1 health care crisis in his state is medical lawsuit abuse and in the past he's called for a $250,000 cap on non-economic damage awards or...

The Medical Assurance Company of Mississippi will reduce its medical liability insurance rates by 5 percent for 2006, state Insurance Commissioner George Dale said Monday. The reduction was approved late last month by MACM's board of directors. The company provides liability insurance for about 70 percent of the state's physicians. "I am pleased that MACM is in a financial position to take these steps. This is further proof that recent reforms continue to show that Mississippi can maintain a fair and equitable marketplace for those companies who write medical malpractice insurance,'' Dale said. The Mississippi Legislature in 2004, responding to...

A DEVASTATED mum yesterday told how blundering doctors removed her healthy breast after wrongly diagnosing cancer. Marjory Patterson, 52, was shattered when she was told - over the telephone - that she had a rare and particularly aggressive form of breast cancer. On the advice of doctors, she agreed to the mastectomy they said she needed to save her life. But three weeks after the op they told her they had been looking at another patient's tissue sample and made a mistake. Now, almost two years later, they have finally offered her compensation - of only £44,000. The Trust's solicitor...

BELLEVILLE -- Dr. Donald I. Serot, one of the metro-east's busiest and most celebrated orthopedic surgeons, will officially hang up his scalpel Aug. 31. Serot, 58, made the decision to retire less than two weeks ago, catching colleagues at Memorial Hospital, as well as hundreds of patients, by surprise. The driving factor, Serot said, was his realization he needed to spend more time with his family, especially his wife Geri, who is suffering from a "debilitating" illness. "My wife has some significant health problems. She cannot drive anymore," said Serot, who lives in suburban St. Louis. "I love my job,...

Just before Tatiana Behrmann moved to Bryn Mawr in June, her Florida doctor diagnosed her with gestational diabetes and told her to find another obstetrician here quickly. More than a month later, Behrmann, 29, was still searching. Due in September, she called doctor after doctor but few could see her before the end of the summer. Those who did turned her away for malpractice reasons because she was high-risk. "It was crazy, I even went to Planned Parenthood, thinking that if anyone would see me, they would, but they don't do prenatal care," said Behrmann. She finally found a high-risk...

The First Coast's 2006 state Senate primary between Jim King and Randall Terry is 15 months away, but fast becoming a bellwether race. At the very least, there is increasing national interest in how such a conservative core of the state defines conservatism, how powerful the religious side of the party continues to be and how big of a tent has been built by the GOP. Former Environmental Protection Agency Administrator and New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman is among the national figures diving into the debate. "This is precisely the type of race I'm interested in, because it's a...

Harvard Medical School's major teaching hospitals are considering adopting a sweeping disclosure policy that would establish detailed procedures for physicians to openly acknowledge medical errors and other bad results to their patients, and provide for training in apologizing. A group of physicians, patients, and executives from the hospitals, led by Dr. Lucian Leape, a national specialist on patient safety, began drafting the policy last year. In recent months, the group circulated a 50-page first draft among hospital leaders, who responded favorably to its broad goals but have suggested numerous revisions, which the group is now implementing. If Harvard's largest teaching...

Republican lawmakers are promising fast action to reverse the effects of a state Supreme Court ruling that overturned the state's caps on malpractice awards for non-economic damages such as pain and suffering. "This is another example of an activist court overstepping its authority," Assembly Speaker John Gard, R-Peshtigo, said in a statement following the court's ruling on Thursday. "Fixing this ruling will be a top priority for Assembly Republicans." The court determined that the Legislature's rationale for putting an upper limit on non-economic damages was too broad and speculative to accept, and ruled the law violated the Wisconsin Constitution's equal...

ALBANY — Private jets. Elite hotel suites in tourist locales. Generous bar tabs. Cuban cigars. These were among the perks enjoyed by board members and executives of Phoebe Putney Health System and their business associates, according to travel documents and receipts obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The perks came courtesy of a private malpractice insurance company that was set up in the Cayman Islands by Phoebe Putney, an Albany-based nonprofit organization, to save the hospital system money on malpractice insurance. But the insurer also financed expensive trips to London and the Bahamas. In its effort to establish the insurer, Phoebe...

More than 9 out of 10 doctors surveyed admit that they practice some form of "defensive medicine” – ordering unnecessary tests or jettisoning potentially troublesome patients to head off malpractice lawsuits. The survey of 824 Pennsylvania physicians in six high-risk specialty practices, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), found: Almost 60 percent said they often ordered more diagnostic tests than necessary. 52 percent referred patients to other specialists even when the referral was unnecessary. About 42 percent said concerns about malpractice lawsuits had forced them to restrict some practices – eliminating procedures prone to complications, such...

More than 90 percent of the Pennsylvania doctors surveyed on the impact of rising malpractice insurance premiums profess to engage in "defensive medicine" -- a catch-all term that includes everything from ordering unnecessary tests to passing off complicated patients. The findings of the May 2003 survey of 824 physicians, all of whom practiced in specialties at high risk of litigation, could help explain why health care costs keep rising. The findings are being published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association as part of a broader effort by the Pew Charitable Trusts to settle on some agreed-upon facts...

It is the law in Louisiana that you have up to three years from an alleged medical malpractice in which to file a lawsuit for damages and expenses. After three years, you don't have a claim. But what if something were left in your body after a surgery and you didn't know about it until long after three years had passed? As it turns out, current Louisiana law dictates that you are out of luck. John Randazzo is a very lucky man who's had some very bad luck. In 1993, John underwent abdominal surgery at Earl K. Long hospital. It...

SPRINGFIELD -- Black lawmakers lashed out Thursday against a deal struck earlier this week that would limit jury awards in medical malpractice cases, and warned Gov. Blagojevich not to count on their political support if he goes along with it. "Sooner or later, the black community is going to rise, and they're going to have to respond to us," said Sen. Kwame Raoul (D-Chicago). "I hope the governor thinks about that before signing this legislation. We've got an election next year, so the Black Caucus can be effective in that regard." A House committee approved the deal Thursday, and the...

Surgeon Goes From 'Brilliant' to Banned By WILLIAM McCALL/Associated Press Writer Fri May 20, 2005 As a young surgeon in upstate New York, Jayant Patel was a rising star, called "brilliant" by the doctors who trained him. But documents obtained by The Associated Press show a darker side — a long record of botched operations, lawsuits and allegations of negligence and incompetence that have trailed him from New York to Oregon to Australia, where the media have given him the sobriquet "Dr. Death." As details have emerged, the Indian-born doctor has taken on a Dr. Jekyll-Mr. Hyde image, raising questions...

BOSTON (AP) - The family of the late paleontologist and evolutionary scientist Stephen Jay Gould sued two Boston hospitals and three doctors Friday, alleging the famed author would still be alive if they had properly diagnosed his cancer four years ago. The doctors all failed to recognize a 1-centimeter lesion on a chest X-ray taken of the Harvard professor in February 2001, according to Alex MacDonald, the lawyer for Gould's survivors. Thirteen months later, when another chest X-ray was taken, the lesion had grown to 3 centimeters and the cancer had spread to Gould's brain, lungs, liver and spleen, MacDonald...

SPRINGFIELD - Two separate bills, both with caps on pain and suffering, moved slowly through the House and Senate on Thursday as Illinois lawmakers continue to heatedly debate the contentious issue of medical malpractice legislation. The House bill calls for a limit of $250,000 on non-economic damage awards against a physician and a $500,000 limit on awards against hospitals. The Senate bill sets caps at $500,000 for physicians and $1 million on hospitals. State Sen. Dave Luechtefeld, R-Okawville, has said throughout the current legislative session that legislators must approve "meaningful" medical malpractice legislation. He said the House version of the...

SPRINGFIELD -- Even as trial lawyers and unions began furiously lobbying lawmakers to oppose a measure that would cap non-economic damages in doctor malpractice cases at $250,000 for physicians and $500,000 for hospitals, a House committee advanced it Wednesday. But after lawmakers screamed at each other during a debate that lasted for hours in the full House, they ultimately rejected a plan to raise those numbers to $1 million for doctors and $2 million for hospitals. As Democrats pledged to pass some sort of bill capping malpractice awards, doctors pledged to work to strip some of the stricter insurance regulations...

I'd been practicing in my small Midwestern farming town for about 10 years when I began treating a woman I'll call Millie. Then 66, she could be classified as a "frequent flier" in my office. Over the roughly six years I was involved in her care, she averaged at least one visit a month, in addition to several hospitalizations. When Millie first came to my clinic, I treated her for depression and heart disease. Over the next few years I also diagnosed PVD, COPD, HTN, diabetes, osteoporosis, and finally lung cancer. Managing Millie's care was challenging; she wasn't very compliant...

HONOLULU - Hawaii faces doctor shortages in at least two fields — obstetrics and orthopedics — because fears of lawsuits and the rising cost of medical malpractice insurance premiums are forcing some to quit. Premiums for physicians who specialize in obstetrics-gynecology are high because insurers are required to pay for the care of injured infants for the remainder of their lives, while orthopedic emergency room work is deemed high risk by because doctors are usually unfamiliar with trauma victims' medical histories. Over the past five years, malpractice insurance for OB-GYNs has risen by 53 percent to $62,500, said Paula Arcena,...

SOUTHERN ILLINOIS - Democrats and Republicans shouted at each other into an early shutdown of the Senate Thursday in Springfield over State Sen. Dave Luechtefeld's medical malpractice bill. Now, Luechtefeld, R-Okawville, fears the measure will be hopelessly lost in a committee backlog. Senate Bill 150 was postponed in a judiciary committee hearing Tuesday. The measure was never called for discussion, even though several physicians came to Springfield to testify on it. Luechtefeld said he suspected the committee, headed by State Sen. John Cullerton, D-Chicago, was stalling and trying to keep the bill from getting to the Senate floor. When Senate...

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) -- Legislators delivered Gov. Matt Blunt the two pillars of his pro-business agenda Wednesday -- passing bills limiting injury claims in the state's courts and workers' compensation system. Business groups reveled in the victory -- the culmination of a three-year effort frustrated in the past by Democratic Gov. Bob Holden but embraced enthusiastically by Missouri's new Republican governor. "At long last!" declared a broadly smiling Dan Mehan, president of the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry. "It truly means that Missouri is open for business again." But labor unions, plaintiffs attorneys and many Democrats predicted injured...

By Gary Null PhD, Carolyn Dean MD ND, Martin Feldman MD, Debora Rasio MD, Dorothy Smith PhD ABSTRACT A definitive review and close reading of medical peer-review journals, and government health statistics shows that American medicine frequently causes more harm than good. The number of people having in-hospital, adverse drug reactions (ADR) to prescribed medicine is 2.2 million.1 Dr. Richard Besser, of the CDC, in 1995, said the number of unnecessary antibiotics prescribed annually for viral infections was 20 million. Dr. Besser, in 2003, now refers to tens of millions of unnecessary antibiotics.2, 2a The number of unnecessary medical and...

The Ohio State Medical Association (OSMA) Frivolous Lawsuit Committee scored a major victory on behalf of Ohio physicians recently when a Stark County judge formally sanctioned a trial attorney for filing a frivolous lawsuit against a Canton-area physician. The judge also ordered the trial attorney to pay $6,000 to the physician as reimbursement for legal expenses incurred as a result of the frivolous suit. "We are very pleased with the positive ruling in this case,” said Almeta E. Cooper, OSMA general counsel and advisor to OSMA's Frivolous Lawsuit Committee, which was instrumental in filing the "motion for sanctions" against trial...

Payouts and claims remained constant, researchers say; medical group, insurance chief dispute findings By Claire Osborn AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF Thursday, March 10, 2005 Rising medical malpractice premiums in Texas aren't the result of more lawsuits or bigger jury verdicts against doctors, as the insurance industry has long contended, according to a study by professors at the University of Texas and two other universities. The study, which will be released today, examined 15 years of data from the Texas Department of Insurance and found that, adjusted for inflation, population and other factors, claim rates and jury verdicts have been stable since 1988....