Posted on 05/20/2005 7:40:19 PM PDT by aculeus
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 said.
"All of a sudden, it was like out of the head of Zeus, he's got fourth-stage cancer," Gould's wife, Rhonda Roland Shearer, said in television interviews Friday. Gould, 60, died 10 weeks later, in May 2002.
"We have a film that clearly shows a lesion that was missed by three doctors, and it should not have been," MacDonald said. "If it had been recognized, professor Gould would still be teaching at Harvard College today."
Gould's family is seeking unspecified damages in the lawsuit, which alleges negligence by the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women's Hospital, as well as Drs. Robert Mayer, Rebecca L. Dyson and Salvatore G. Viscomi. It was filed in Middlesex Superior Court in Cambridge.
Dana-Farber, where Mayer is director of the Center for Gastrointestinal Oncology, released a statement saying the charges are "misleading and inaccurate."
"The claims against Dr. Mayer, who is a medical oncologist, are without merit and there is simply no basis for holding him responsible for the alleged failure to diagnose" the cancer, the statement said.
Brigham and Women's, where radiologists Viscomi and Dyson worked, released a statement that said "the legal process is the appropriate forum to respond to the allegations."
Mayer did not immediately return a telephone message left at his office. A telephone number for Viscomi was not in service. A man who answered the telephone at Dyson's home in California said she would have no comment.
Gould had a long-standing relationship with Mayer dating to 1982, when Gould was diagnosed with another form of cancer, peritoneal mesothelioma, according to the lawsuit. Gould was cured of that illness and saw Mayer a number of times a year for cancer screenings, the lawsuit said.
Although Gould's original cancer was unrelated to the lung cancer that ultimately killed him, because of Gould's cancer history, doctors "would have a heightened duty to look for lung cancers," MacDonald said.
Gould's cancer history "was a literal flashing red light warning," according to the lawsuit. "That warning was inexplicably, negligently and ... grossly negligently ignored by the three defendants."
Gould became one of America's most recognizable scientists for his voluminous and accessible writings and his participation in public debates with creationists.
He also was at odds with other evolutionists for his suggestion that evolution proceeds in fits and starts, a pattern dubbed "punctuated equilibrium," rather than slowly over time.
Gould's book "The Mismeasure of Man" won the National Book Critics Award in 1982 and was No. 24 on the Modern Library's list of the 100 greatest English-language nonfiction works of the 20th century. His more recent popular books included "Dinosaur in a Haystack" and "Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life."
There's just layers of irony in that sentence.
Wow, cool...it was literally a flashing red light warning!! Wish I coulda seen THAT!
I actually took Gould's last go of his famous introductory evolution class at Harvard. The other final class was cancelled.
A few weeks before he died I saw him alone walking along and was able to thank him personally. He was a great teacher.
Personally I think the world is much better off without the pompous ass. Ive seen a few lectures of his and his unwaivering resentment of Christianity was just revolting.
My beloved Dad, who was a General Practitioner and one of the BEST diagnosticians of all time initially read his own chest X-ray incorrectly and assured me that all would be well. A mere three months later, through his diabetically, Macular degenerative challenged eyesight, he saw his latest chest xray and said "I'm a Goner"!
He saw the best of the best at Mass General and Dana Farber. They were wonderful, professional caregivers, did all they could!. We were priveledged enough to have him with us through fourth of July Family reunion.
He died some 12 days later after saying goodbye to all.
You never know!
Every single Dr. concurred,, it initially looked like pneumonia...... was Adinocarcinoma of the Lung!
Sometimes God takes us when we are ready, other times are meant to be a challenge to our personal fortitude and spirit!
Sometimes people are too stupid to realize that and go looking for money as some type of salvation, recompense, whatever.
ALWAYS THERE IS AN ATTORNEY MAKING MONEY SOMEHOW!!
Won't say there are not mistakes made but ..generally
folks seem to see personal injury lawsuits as equivalent to winning the lottery!
I suspect that's going a bit far, actually. He might still be fighting it but he'd be a very sick man at the very least. The assumption is that it hadn't metastasized at that point, and there's simply no way you can be sure of that.
In my opinion, that was his greatest flaw.
Evolution wasn't kind to him, I guess.
Bingo
I would emphasize the "self-proclaimed" and although I am geologist, not an evolutionary biologist, some of his stuff went so far out of line that even I could smell its stench.
One of the great ironies is that he attacked other biologists so strongly that many creationists were able to misportray the state of evolutionary theory as "in disarray" or "debatable"...
Somehow the phrase "God's will" seems appropriate and ironic.
Survival of the Fittest
And he used his knowledge of baseball to make himself seem "one of the people." I am sorry that he is dead, but he was an bad influence on on scientific thought and debate.
Now, f Harvard can get rid of more of these evil white men, they have the opportunity to have the faculty look like it should.
He was very sick the year before as well. He had to cancel several classes at one point. Probably the same time they took this X-ray.
And as an atheist evolutionist he had nothing to fear when he died. Yet I have no doubt that as he died he had his doubts.
A lot like Carl Sagan.
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