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Welcome and thank you for joining me. I’m Gerry Oginski, a New York medical malpractice
and personal injury trial lawyer practicing law here in the state of New York. Today’s
video tip involves surgical misadventure. What does that mean? It means that you go
in for what appears to be a routine surgical procedure and you come out with massive complications
and hospitalization. Well how can that happen? Well, it can happen in a number of ways. And
the doctors and their defense attorneys like to say that many of these complications are
known risks for the procedure. And in fact, many times they are. The problem arises when
a particular complication comes about because a doctor fails to recognize that there is
a problem during the course of surgery – there is misadventure. The doctor, of course, doesn’t
intentionally mean for these things to happen, they don’t wake up in the middle of the
night and say hey, who can I screw up the following morning during surgery. It’s carelessness,
it’s negligence. And as a result of carelessness during the course of surgery, they may inadvertently
cause you harm. Well, in the state of New York, a patient who has suffered harm as a
result of that carelessness is entitled to be compensated for the injuries that they
have incurred through no fault of their own. So what happens in this particular case? Well,
the doctor does the procedure, closes the patient up, and he returns home. Over the
course of the next 14 days, the patient is having significant complaints and continues
to call the doctor’s office with them. The doctor literally brushes him off and says
“You know what? If you’re having any ongoing problems you can always go to the emergency
room, otherwise follow up with me in a few days.” And that’s exactly what the patient
did. The problem was that after about 14 days, the patient could barely stand up anymore.
He was having such significant abdominal pain and such tremendous back pain that it forced
him to go to the emergency room. The MRIs that were done – and other diagnostic tests
– showed that this patient needed to be operated on immediately. They recognized that
part of the common bile duct – that’s the duct that leads from the gall bladder
to other areas – was clipped off and the only way that happened was during the original
surgery to remove the gall bladder. That is something that should never, ever be clipped
off. And as a result of that being clipped, the bile that drains didn’t have any place
to go so it was backing up into the common bile duct, causing this patient to have lots
and lots of problems. After a lengthy hospitalization, the patient was left with drainage tubes to
drain fluid and bile for approximately 6 months. So why do I bring this up? Because if the
surgeon had been careful during the course of surgery, he would have recognized that
the common bile duct was clipped, he could have removed the clip, and put it in the correct
position. And this patient would not have had to endure the two weeks of excruciating
and agonizing pain that he went through, that led him to the emergency room. The patient
would not have had to have emergency surgery with a huge abdominal incision that was about
12 inches long, and he would not have had another 6 to 8 months of recuperation following
all that. So why do I tell you all this? Because if you think you’ve been the victim of surgical
misadventure, of carelessness and negligence that occurred during the course of your surgical
procedure, then I want you to pick up the phone and call me because I can answer your
legal questions. I can let you know whether or not your case is timely. And I can give
you an idea as to what I think just on the basis of the facts that you describe to me
over the phone and then I can let you know whether or not it’s worthwhile to investigate
your particular case. And the way to do that is calling me at 516-487-8207 or by email
at lawmed10@yahoo.com. I want to thank you for joining me. I’m Gerry Oginski, have
a great day!