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A medical malpractice lawsuit currently being waged in Tennessee raises a thorny question as to who is ultimately responsible for preventing retained objects and who is at fault if they occur. The case centers on a surgical sponge left inside a patient undergoing an abdominal procedure. While the sponge was successfully removed during a second surgery weeks later, the patient's family sued the surgeon who performed the procedure for negligence. The surgeon argued that he was not liable for the retained object, maintaining that his primary responsibility was the procedure itself and that he relied on the attending nurses to conduct the surgical count before he closed the incision — a count that, in this case, was incorrect.
