An Ohio appeals court has upheld a lower court's judgment in favor of a surgery center, orthopedic surgeon and CRNA who'd been sued by a patient after her lung was punctured during a regional block placement.
The plaintiff, Kathy Rhoads, alleged that Terry Brown, CRNA, of Pickaway Anesthesia Associates punctured her lung when performing an interscalene block before Ms. Rhoads' shoulder surgery at Physicians Ambulatory Surgery Center in Columbus, Ohio, in March 2002. Ms. Rhoads contends in court documents that she complained of severe chest pain "during and after" the block placement, but neither the center's nurses, nor Ms. Brown, nor surgeon Michael Lefkowitz, MD, realized she had suffered a collapsed lung.
Ms. Rhoads further alleges that she contacted Dr. Lefkowitz's office with more complaints of chest pain a week later, but was told not to come in for another 2 days, at which point he ordered a chest X-ray. Later that evening, Ms. Rhoads was taken to the emergency room for treatment of the pneumothorax, which was discovered in the X-ray. The treatment required a 5-day hospital stay, court documents show.
Ms. Rhoads sued the surgery center, CRNA and surgeon, claiming that:
Ms. Brown and Dr. Lefkowitz failed to recognize the treat the block complication.
Dr. Lefkowitz was negligent in training and supervising the physician's assistant who had instructed Ms. Rhoads to wait 2 days before seeing the doctor.
The center was negligent in training and supervising its personnel, who also failed to recognize her condition.
All 3 parties named in the suit have been cleared due to Ms. Rhoads' failure to provide expert testimony or sufficient evidence backing up her claims of negligence.
The trial court dismissed the surgery center from the suit when Ms. Rhoads failed to provide an affidavit of merit showing that the facility breached the standard of care in this case. It then granted summary judgment to Ms. Brown and Dr. Lefkowitz when it found that Ms. Rhoads did not produce adequate evidence or expert testimony to back her claims and counter the defense.
Ms. Rhoads appealed all 3 trial court rulings, and they were each upheld by the Fourth District Court of Appeals of Ohio on Aug. 12.
Irene Tsikitas
