Court: Surgeon Is Not Liable for Unforeseeable Post-Op Complications

If a patient suffers a little-known neurological syndrome after surgery that wasn't covered in the informed consent documents, is the surgeon liable for the injury? Not if the injury was unforeseeable, according to a recent Georgia appeals court ruling.

In a case in which a patient sued her oral surgeon over neck and face pain after having a wisdom tooth pulled, the Court of Appeals of Georgia last month cited the state's malpractice laws that say: "When the injuries could not reasonably have been foreseen as the natural, reasonable and probable result of the original negligent act, then there can be no recovery" by the plaintiff.

After oral surgery in 2001, Cynthia Thompson sued Jeffrey R. Princell, DMD, MD, of Marietta, Ga., because she claimed that Dr. Princell did not sufficiently disclose the risks of the surgery. During the 25-minute surgery, Dr. Princell damaged Ms. Thompson's inferior alveolar nerve, according to court documents.

At the end of the trial in state court, the jury sided with Dr. Princell. Ms. Thompson appealed the jury verdict, claiming that the court did not properly educate the jury on laws related to informed consent and the foreseeability of post-op complications.

Ms. Thompson claimed that she should have been warned about the risk of her face and neck pain, known as neuropathic pain syndrome. But physicians testified that neuropathic pain syndrome is not necessarily a foreseeable complication for tooth extraction. During the trial, 3 oral surgeons told the court that they knew little about the causes of the neuropathic pain syndrome and its association with extraction of wisdom teeth, according to court documents.

In the opinion, the appeals judges reiterated the 6 elements required for informed consent documents in Georgia. They are: