Richmond Jury Awards Postpartum Patient $1.5 Million After Obstetrician Missed Uterine Abscess
After trial: The jury verdict was $1.5 million, and the parties settled afterward for $1.45 million to avoid an appeal. The case name was not made public, and we could not confirm further payment details.
Won by Emroch & Kilduff and Richmond, Virginia.
A Richmond woman went to the emergency room two days after a cesarean delivery with pain, fever and a CT scan suggesting a uterine abscess. Her obstetrician treated her for a routine postpartum infection for about a week, and she then needed a laparotomy to remove necrotic uterine tissue. A Richmond Circuit Court jury returned $1.5 million in March 2018, and the parties settled for $1.45 million to avoid an appeal.
What happened
A Richmond woman gave birth to her first child by cesarean section. Two days after she was discharged, she returned to the emergency room with abdominal pain, a fever and an elevated white blood count. A CT scan was read as possibly showing an abscess on her uterus, and the emergency physician believed she had one.
The obstetrician who admitted her did not agree. The doctor thought an abscess was unlikely and treated her for a common postpartum infection with IV antibiotics. According to the plaintiff's case, the scan described a fluid collection with gas bubbles and an enhancing rim, findings that point toward an abscess, and the physician discounted them for several days. Over the next 48 to 72 hours she showed only minimal improvement.
By the seventh day of the admission her condition had deteriorated. An infectious disease consultant ordered a repeat CT scan, which showed that the fluid collection was almost certainly an abscess. She then underwent a complex laparotomy to remove uterine tissue that had become necrotic. As a result, she cannot carry another child.
The case was tried to a jury in Richmond Circuit Court before Judge Melvin Hughes. William B. Kilduff, Christopher L. Spinelli and W. Randolph Robins Jr., all of Richmond, represented the patient. Their experts were Dr. Eric Swisher, an obstetrician-gynecologist, Dr. Gerald Donowitz, an infectious disease physician, and Dr. Robert Sheiman, a radiologist. The defense answered with Dr. Alfred Abuhamad, Dr. Allen Morrison and Dr. Brian Holly in the same three specialties. The defense made no settlement offer before the verdict.
The jury deliberated for about an hour and a half on March 29, 2018, and returned a verdict of $1.5 million for the patient. The obstetrician's malpractice carrier was The Doctors Company.
The parties then settled for $1.45 million to avoid an appeal, and that settlement is the amount that stood.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
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