Jury Awards $3.6 Million to Infant Burned by a Leaking IV Line in Georgetown's Newborn ICU
A premature newborn suffered a permanent chemical burn and stunted growth in her right ankle after an IV line leaked caustic fluid into the surrounding tissue, and a District of Columbia jury awarded her $3.6 million.
What happened
She was born nine weeks early at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital on January 2, 2013, and spent her first days in the newborn intensive care unit. On January 16, the staff was feeding her through an intravenous line placed in her right ankle. The line carried liquid nutrition, fat, and the antibiotic vancomycin, the kind of support a premature infant depends on to survive.
That day the catheter tip slipped out of the vein and into the soft tissue around it. Fluid meant for the bloodstream began leaking into the muscle and fat of her ankle. This failure, known as an infiltration or extravasation, turned the caustic mixture into a chemical burn. Puffiness at an IV site is a recognized warning sign of exactly this problem, and it matters most in a baby this small, because the longer the leak runs, the deeper the burn goes.
The harm fell on a two-week-old who could not move away from the pain or tell anyone about it. By the time the case reached trial she was five years old, with a tight scar wrapped around her right ankle. She could not set her right foot flat on the floor, and the injured leg was growing more slowly than the other because the burn had reached the growth plate. The care she had already gone through managed the damage rather than reversing it, and her doctors expected more procedures through her adolescence as her body kept growing around the scar.
The family hired Patrick Malone of Patrick Malone & Associates. At trial in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, Malone argued that the bedside nursing care let the IV go unchecked while the fluid kept seeping into the tissue. The swelling that should have stopped the line early was allowed to continue, and each hour the leak ran added to the burn. Closing arguments were delivered on November 5, 2018.
The jury returned a verdict of $3.6 million. The hospital then asked the court to throw out or shrink the award, moving for remittitur and a new trial. The trial judge denied those motions and let the full $3.6 million stand.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
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