$6.13 Million Verdict After Hospital Discharged Chest-Pain Patient Who Died Hours Later
Won by Brown Moore & Associates.
A jury awarded $6.13 million to the family of a 53-year-old man who died of a heart attack hours after CMC-Northeast discharged him, finding the hospital's reckless disregard of his safety eliminated the NC statutory noneconomic damages cap.
What happened
On April 30, 2012, EMS brought Anthony Lawrence Savino to CMC-Northeast after he reported chest pain radiating down both arms with tingling and numbness. Paramedics administered aspirin, nitroglycerin, and IV fluids and documented his care in an EMS snapshot before handing him off to the emergency department. After a few hours in the ER, the hospital discharged him.
That evening, Savino's wife found him unresponsive. He suffered a fatal heart attack and died before EMS could revive him. He was 53 years old.
The estate, represented by R. Kent Brown and Jon Moore of Brown Moore and Associates along with co-counsel from Zaytoun Ballew and Taylor, argued that hospital staff failed to communicate the EMS snapshot information, including the aspirin and nitroglycerin treatment, to the physician overseeing Savino's care. That gap in communication, the plaintiffs contended, led to a workup that fell short of what a chest-pain protocol required. According to Moore, had Savino been admitted to the chest pain unit, the signs of the oncoming cardiac event would have been detectable in time to save his life.
On November 15, 2016, a Cabarrus County jury returned a verdict of $6,130,000, comprising $680,000 in economic damages and $5,500,000 for pain and suffering. Critically, the jury also found that the hospital acted with reckless disregard for Savino's rights and safety. Under North Carolina law, that finding stripped the hospital of the protection of the state's $515,000 statutory cap on noneconomic damages, leaving the full award intact.
The hospital appealed. The NC Court of Appeals reversed on several grounds, including the pain-and-suffering award. The estate sought further review, and on September 25, 2020, the North Carolina Supreme Court modified and affirmed in part, reversed the Court of Appeals in part, and upheld the $6,130,000 verdict, restoring what the jury had originally awarded.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
More proven verdicts from Brown Moore & Associates
All Brown Moore & Associates proven verdicts →A federal jury awarded $15.1 million to a quadriplegic railroad worker and his wife after a CSX train struck his vehicle at a blind crossing in 1985, making it the largest personal injury verdict in North Carolina history at the time, though the Fourth Circuit later vacated the judgment and remanded for retrial.
A Union County jury found general contractor Bonterra Builders grossly negligent after a 46-year-old construction worker was fatally crushed when a trench wall collapsed beneath him, returning a $3.85 million compensatory verdict for his widow.
Related medical malpractice verdicts
A Utah judge entered a $951 million default judgment against Steward Health Care after newly trained nurses, an excessive Pitocin drip, and a delayed C-section at Jordan Valley Medical Center left a newborn permanently brain damaged.
A Gainesville jury awarded $900 million, including $700 million in punitive damages, to stroke survivor Joseph Webb over neglect at the University Place Care and Rehabilitation Center, in a Wilkes & McHugh case tried against defaulted Trans Healthcare entities with no defense present, but Florida's First District Court of Appeal reversed the judgment in 2013 because the trial court had refused to let a defense lawyer appear, and the money was never collected; the estate's claim was later resolved for a small share of a multi-estate bankruptcy settlement.
A Clark County jury ordered Health Plan of Nevada and Sierra Health Services to pay $524 million after finding the UnitedHealth Group subsidiaries negligently credentialed a gastroenterologist whose unsafe injection practices at his Las Vegas endoscopy clinics caused the largest medically caused hepatitis C outbreak in American history.
Georgia Hayes, a Kansas City area ovarian cancer patient, sued pharmacist Robert Courtney after learning he had diluted the chemotherapy drugs used in her treatment. A Jackson County jury found Courtney liable and awarded Hayes $225,571,439 in compensatory damages and $2 billion in punitive damages, the first of hundreds of similar suits against Courtney to reach trial. The trial judge later found the award excessive and cut it by remittitur to $330,071,439, and that reduced judgment stood. Hayes herself and the case reporter covering the verdict both said she was unlikely to ever collect a significant portion of it.