Philadelphia Personal Injury Attorney Blog - Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis LLP

A South Dakota woman whose legs were amputated because of problems following knee-replacement surgery will get a new trial in her malpractice lawsuit against two doctors and their clinic.

The South Dakota Supreme Court ruled that Adeline Papke is entitled to a new trial because the judge in her first trial gave the jury an improper instruction that probably influenced the jury's decision to rule against her.

The judge's instructions to the jury said a doctor is not necessarily negligent because of an error in judgment. The Supreme Court says that reference to an error in judgment does not explain the standard of care at issue in malpractice lawsuits.

The ruling gives Papke another trial in her lawsuit against Dr. Thomas Harbert, Dr. Mark Harlow and their clinic, Aberdeen Orthopedics and Sports Medicine.

If you or a loved one has suffered or died due to medical malpractice in Philadelphia, please contact the experienced medical malpractice attorneys at Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis, serving clients in and around Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Purdue University in Indiana has agreed to settle out of court with a family whose son died on campus after being electrocuted. The body of freshman student Wade Steffey of Bloomington, Indiana was found two months after he was electrocuted in a high voltage university utility room. The university claims he was intoxicated at the time of his death, but doctors hired by the family dispute that.

It took two months to find the young man's body after he was reported missing. Wade was last seen in January at Purdue's Owen Hall dormitory. His body was found two months later in the building's high voltage room after weeks of intensive searches. Investigators determined that Steffey was accidentally electrocuted inside the room. Consultants hired by the university concluded that the door to the room had been left unlocked.

Steffey's family received the maximum allowable damages under Indiana law.

While Purdue University has not formally accepted responsibility for Steffey's death, it has secured its buildings' high voltage rooms, making them inaccessible, while helping to establish and fund a scholarship in Wade Steffey's name.

If you have been injured or a loved has been injured or died due to no fault of their own, please contact a Pennsylvania personal injury attorney at Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis, serving clients in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

PharmaFab, a distributor of more than 100 different drug products, has entered a legal agreement with the FDA under which they will stop the illegal manufacture and distribution of prescription and over-the-counter drugs. In the past, PharmaFab has sold items not made according to the current good manufacturing practice (CGMP), and many of its products did not have the required FDA approval.

PharmaFab has also been ordered to destroy all their illegal drugs and is barred from distributing all drug products until it fully complies with CGMP and gets the required FDA approval.

Just a few of the drugs distributed by PharmaFab include:

Rhinacon A Tablets
Sudal 12 Chewable Tablets
Atuss HX CIII
Histex PD 12 Suspension
De-Congestine Sustained Release Capsules

If you or a loved one has suffered adverse side effects from a drug or medical device in the Philadelphia area, please call the experienced legal team of Pomerantz, Perlberger & Lewis, specializing in Personal Injury, Medical Malpractice and Vehicle Accidents, to schedule your initial consultation.

A civil lawsuit filed recently against the Comcast Corporation and several of its subsidiaries by a New Jersey worker could have lasting repercussions on the multi-billion dollar company and change the way they conduct business statewide, the plaintiff's attorney says.

Attorney Matt Jarve, who is representing Pennsville, NJ resident Joseph Callahan and his wife, Kim, in the suit, said he believes that if the suit is successful, Comcast would have to essentially rewrite the books for its safety standards.

"This is cutting edge stuff. My legal team's research has found there is no precedent in New Jersey for this type of suit," said Jarve. "It could have a resounding impact on the way this type of work is completed, making it safer across the board for the workforce."

Callahan, 48, of Riviera Drive in Pennsville, suffered from a traumatic brain injury, blood clots and a shoulder injury that would later require surgery after falling from a ladder on Aug. 16, 2005 while working on the cable lines on a utility pole. Comcast cable lines are required to be 19 feet or higher to clear any type of vehicle, and must be above all Verizon lines, according to the suit. It is unclear how high Callahan was when he fell.

Though he says he is lucky to be alive, Callahan claims that the quality of that life has dropped considerably since the accident. Jarve says he will attempt to prove in court that the accident was the result of alleged carelessness, recklessness and negligence on the part of Comcast.

The suit alleges that OSHA requirements and industry standards to protect workers require a secure and stable platform for the type of work being performed by Callahan, and that a bucket truck with a lift or comparable equipment should have been utilized. Callahan was using a ladder at the time of the accident.

If you or a loved one has been seriously injured while working in Pennsylvania, please contact a Pennsylvania Personal Injury Attorney at Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis today to schedule your initial consultation.

Attorneys for Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center have filed an appeal in the Brock Higham medical malpractice lawsuit. Now 24-year-old Brock Higham will have to wait to see if he will still be awarded millions of dollars that a Bonneville county jury said he deserves.The jury decision was handed down in May, but the hospital feels their verdict was not in harmony with the facts of the case and stand by their claim that they did not cause Higham's injuries.

Statement from EIRMC The hospital defended Brock Higham's lawsuit again us not because we lack sympathy for his circumstances, but because we provided good care to Brock four years ago, and we did not cause his injuries."

At the trial of Higham vs. Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center, jury members listened to testimony from the Higham family and medical personel before coming back with a verdict in favor of Brock Higham.

The jury determined EIRMC did breach its standard of care when back in 2002 Higham went into EIRMC for a same-day wrist operation and left with permanent brain damage.
The hospital, to this day, does not believe they were responsible saying, "We believe the testimony and medical evidence do not support the claims made by the opposing lawyers. We believe the appellate court will correct the situation and determine that the conduct of the nursing personnel met the standards required."

After the verdict was read, the Higham family pleaded with the hospital administration to not appeal the jury decision saying, "We would also like to make a plea to Doug Crabtree and Lou Fatkin to not appeal this jury decision. This could delay Brock's owed money for two more years. Brock is in need of vital therapies that are not available in our area. The window of opportunity for Brock's Recovery is closing, and time is of the essence."

After hearing of the appeal, the Higham family said they would prefer to have Brock make a statement, but at this time is he is too upset to do so.

If you or a loved one has suffered or died due to medical malpractice in Philadelphia, please contact the experienced medical malpractice attorneys at Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis, serving clients in and around Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

The parents of a severely disabled man who choked to death while eating a hot dog at a day shelter are suing the facility's operator, claiming negligence. Gregory and Betty Jo Payne filed the lawsuit in Kanawha County, West Virginia Circuit Court against Deaf Education and Advocacy Focus, Inc., a non-profit group based in South Charleston, West Virginia.

Craig Payne, the 22-year-old son of the Paynes who had cerebral palsy, died in February 2007 at DEAF's West Sattes Adult Day Treatment Center in Nitro. A worker assigned to Payne that day wasn't trained to work with him and didn't know he couldn't eat solid food, the lawsuit alleges.

The lawsuit also alleges that no workers attempted to perform the Heimlich maneuver when Payne began choking; no one immediately called for an ambulance either. The plaintiff's attorney, Bill Forbes said the workers' improper training and improper application of protocols caused his clients' son's death.

Under pressure from the state, DEAF closed its West Sattes site and another one of its programs in another county in West Virginia. Eighty disabled adults had to be transferred to other programs.

If you or a loved one has suffered or died as a result of someone else's negligence in Philadelphia, you should contact a Pennsylvania Wrongful Death Lawyer at Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis today to schedule your personal consultation.

A woman from Beaumont, Texas is seeking over $5 million in damages from two local doctors and a hospital after an infection resulted in the loss of her left eye. Georgia Black filed a medical malpractice lawsuit recently against Christus Hospital St. Elizabeth, Dr. Shungman Kirby Lee and Dr. Eric Adam Mark. According to the petition, Ms. Black had been under the care of Dr. Lee for several years for chronic kidney disease, diabetic nephropathy and high blood pressure.

In July 2005, she went to the emergency room at the hospital for those pre-existing medical conditions and was admitted. The suit says she consulted with Dr. Lee, who advised her to remain at the hospital and continue treatment with Dr. Mark, the attending physician. According to the petition, Ms. Black "incurred endophthalmitis of her left eye while a patient at Chrustus St. Elizabeth Hospital as a result of a catheter being placed..."

Endophthalmitis is a condition involving inflammation and swelling within the eyeball and is most often caused by infection with bacteria or other micro-organisms. It was the defendant's delay in treatment that caused Ms. Black to lose her left eye.

She is seeking damages for past and future medical expenses, physical pain and suffering, mental anguish, impairment, psychological treatment and loss of service.

If you or a loved one has suffered or died due to medical malpractice in Philadelphia, please contact the experienced medical malpractice attorneys at Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis, serving clients in and around Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

In Florida, a jury has awarded $25.8 million to the family of a cancer patient who was given a wrong prescription, suffered a stroke, and died. This was one of the largest awards in Florida wrongful death history. Writing and filling prescriptions incorrectly is a very common form of medical malpractice that can lead to serious injury and death.

In 2002, Beth Hippely was prescribed Warfarin, a blood thinner, to treat her breast cancer. However, an inexperienced 19-year-old pharmacy technician filled her prescription incorrectly and gave her ten times the amount of what the doctor ordered for her.

This particular error caused a cerebral hemorrhage resulting in permanent bodily injury, disability and physical pain. Mrs. Hippely, a mother of three, was just 46 years old when she died. Chris Searcy, one of the lawyers for the Hippely family, has said, "Beth Hippely died unnecessarily because this tenfold overdose with Warfarin by the pharmacy she trusted caused her cancer to come back with a vengeance and it interrupted all of her cancer treatments."

If you or a loved one has suffered or died due to a prescription error or any other form of medical malpractice in Pennsylvania, please visit the website of a Philadelphia medical malpractice attorney at Pomerantz, Perlberger & Lewis today

The Minnesota Supreme Court has decided to give a Minnesota family a new trial in their medical malpractice suit against the Mayo Foundation. Michael and Nancy Becker adopted Nykkole Rossini after she suffered a permanent brain injury at the hands of her biological father who was later sent to prison for his crime.

The lawsuit, filed in 2001, notes that Nykkole was born in July 1997. When she was just three and a half weeks old, she was brought to Saint Mary's Hospital with a fracture. There were previous emergency room visits to Mayo before the one to St. Mary's in September 1997, when she was brought to the hospital with skull fractures and a subdural hematoma. Doctors diagnosed Nykkole with shaken baby syndrome. She suffered permanent brain damage. At that time, she was hospitalized, and the state of Minnesota took custody of her. She was eventually placed in the care of the Beckers as foster parents; who later adopted her.

Because of her injuries, Nykkole will never function beyond the level of an infant and will need 24-hour care for the rest of her life. In January 2004, a jury found that Mayo had been negligent in their care of the little girl but found the negligence did not directly cause the injuries she later suffered at the hands of her biological father. The couple claimed that they did not get a fair trial because the trial court erroneously excluded evidence of Mayo's failure to report the suspected abuse to outside authorities.

The lawsuit further alleged that the doctors at Mayo had deviated from the accepted standard of professional skill and care by not reporting suspected child abuse to outside authorities. The Minnesota Supreme Court ruled on August 16, 2007 that the district court erred when it excluded all evidence related to a hospital's responsibility to report suspected child abuse. The court ruled that the excluded evidence might have changed the result of the trial.

One of the Becker's attorneys, said that the new trial is an opportunity to have the responsible party pay for the girl's care and spare taxpayers from having to cover those costs.

If you or a loved one has suffered due to personal injury resulting from medical malpractice in Philadelphia or anywhere in Pennsylvania, please contact the Medical Malpractice Law Offices of Pomerantz, Perlberger & Lewis today to schedule your initial consultation.

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