Gair, Gair, Conason, Rubinowitz, Bloom, Hershenhorn, Steigman & Mackauf is a New York Plaintiff's personal injury law firm specializing in automobile accidents, construction accidents, medical malpractice, products liability, police misconduct and all types of New York personal injury litigation.

Articles Posted in Medical Malpractice

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MontefioreThe 3 emergency units at Montefiore Hospital in New York are so overcrowded and unruly that it endangered patients and staffers.

Patients have to wait for hours to be treated and staffers are regularly attacked by psych patients. According to a nurse working there who was recently interviewed by the New York Daily News, the ER units at Montefiore look like a refugee camp in a war zone.

Last week, Ritchie Torres, a City Councilman sent a letter to the Department of Investigation to ask for an immediate probe.

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Bud FrazierBud Frazier is a surgeon who is recognized worldwide for his role in the development of mechanical heart pumps and  artificial hearts. Devices that are credited Today with extending the lives of thousands of people worldwide each year were tested at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center and its research partner, the Texas Heart Institute. However the doctor and his research team committed serious medical malpractice to develop the devices. According to a new investigation released by ProPublica, the surgeon is accused of violating federal research rules and ethical guidelines.

Highly unethical research leading to preventable deaths

Frazier is accused of implementing experimental heart pumps in patients who didn’t meet the criteria to be included in clinical trials.  Also, Frazier used his experimental pumps on patients who could have been treated with more proven  treatments. The surgeon tried to discourage the publication of research that showed that the first group of patients that were implanted with his device suffered from a high rate of strokes. Frazier never disclosed consulting fees and research grants that he received from the companies that made the pumps that he tested. According to the testimony of a nurse, Frazier also allowed an unlicensed researcher to treat heart failures.

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Only one Manhattan acute care hospital obtained a Top A grade in the Spring 2018 Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grades: the NYC Health Hospitals –  Metropolitan in East Harlem.

Most of the others, NYU Langone Medical Center, NYC Health + Hospitals / Bellevue, Mount Sinai West, New York-Presbyterian , Northwell Health System – Lenox Hill Hospital, The Mount Sinai Hospital, NYC Health + Hospitals – Harlem and Mount Sinai St. Luke’s all obtained a C. Mount Sinai Beth Israel had the worst Manhattan score with a D on a scale of A for the best to F for the worst.

The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grades is a nationwide bi-annual rating that focuses on acute care hospital errors, accidents, injuries and infections that collectively are the third leading cause of death in the United States. Based on the data provided by the report here is what we found for Manhattan hospitals.

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New York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Jeffrey BloomNYC personal Injury lawyer Richard SteigmanOur partner, New York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Jeffrey Bloom, will be the Program Chair of the “Failure to Diagnose Breast Cancer” seminar organized by the New York State Bar Association.  Richard Steigman who is also a partner at our firm will be a speaker and will provide an Overview of the Governing Laws related to such cases.

During this seminar participants will learn how to handle the failure to diagnose breast cancer medical malpractice case. Featuring nationally recognized medical experts in oncology and cancer detection, the morning session will cover the diagnosis, prognosis and treatment of breast cancer and provide attendees with an understanding of the medical background necessary to handle these cases. During the afternoon portion of the program leading medical malpractice trial attorneys will present an overview of case selection, trial strategies and the art of explaining technical medical concepts to jurors.

Don’t miss this opportunity to learn more about this area of law.

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A very well organized network of profiteer personal injury law firms, doctors, marketers and finance executives have teamed up together to try to make profit out of women who previously had a vaginal mesh surgery by leading them into believing something is wrong with their implant. A recent article in the New York Time looks at the cases of multiple women who previously had a vaginal mesh implant and were contacted by unidentified callers lying to them and pretending that their implants were defective to lure them into expensive, dangerous and unnecessary surgery.

Hired and trained by a marketing company, the callers usually know most of the medical history of the women that they were calling. Victims of these calls are often told that if they don’t undergo surgery to remove the mesh they might die. The caller then set the woman up with:

  • the law firm that initially hired the marketing company
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More than twenty years ago, a medication was developed that can save lives and reduce the disabling impacts of a stroke. Known as tissue plasminogen activator (or “T.P.A.”), this medication is now considered the gold standard for the treatment of ischemic strokes by the American Stroke Association.

Generally speaking, there are two types of strokes that can occur—ischemic stroke or hemorrhagic stroke. An ischemic stroke occurs when there is an obstruction to one of the vessels that supplies blood to the brain. A hemorrhagic stroke occurs when a blood vessel ruptures and bleeds into the area surrounding the brain. T.P.A. can only be used to treat ischemic strokes. When timely used to treat an ischemic stroke, it can be a brain-saving treatment.

RECENT STUDIES SHOW TPA CAN PREVENT BRAIN INJURY AFTER A STROKE BUT SKEPTICS SAY TPA IS DANGEROUS

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New York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Jeffrey BloomNew York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Ben RubinowitzOur partner,  New York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Jeffrey Bloom will be chairing the “Anatomy & Medicine for Lawyers” program offered by the New York State Bar Association Thursday March 29th from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm at the CFA Society, 1540 Broadway #1010 in New York City. The program will also be webcasted live.

During the program Jeffrey will talk about preparing a medical malpractice case. He will discuss cases from both the plaintiff and defense perspectives. Our managing partner, Ben Rubinowitz will also attend the program as a speaker. He will lecture, about orthopedic and spinal injuries. He will be joined by Dr James Naidich, a radiologist in discussing these types of injuries.

This unique program will familiarize medical malpractice attorneys and personal injury attorneys (both plaintiff and defense) as well as workers’ compensation attorneys with the medical concepts and terminology necessary to

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New York Personal Injury Attorneys Rubinowitz and TorganIn their latest Trial Advocacy column in the New York Law Journal, NYC Personal Injury Attorneys Ben Rubinowitz and Evan Torgan write: Concurrent or overlapping surgeries are becoming more common in major teaching hospitals. Although studies have suggested that the practice can be performed without endangering patient safety, the attorney prosecuting such a case should focus on the motives behind the practice. Developing “case frames” such as profit over safety will certainly answer questions in the minds of jurors as to who benefits from double booking.

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Hospital-PatientTo avoid medical malpractice and make sure their patients are safe, good healthcare organizations stay proactive and identify actual and new risks of medical malpractice to better address them. Every year the ECRI institute, a non profit organization advocating for patient safety, compiles a list of the most urgent issues to be addressed by these organizations. The list, based on more than 2 million events reported to the ECRI Institute, highlights high priority concerns and new risks related to patients safety and proposes solutions to address them.

Diagnostic errors stay the main concern

Diagnostic errors and the opiod epidemic continue to be at the top of the list.  Poor Internal Care coordination resulting in  numerous medical errors continue to be a major safety concern as well. Staff bending work rules to circumvent or temporary fix what they perceive as a barrier or a system flaw and often unintentionally  putting the patient in unsafe condition is also a main issue faced by healthcare organizations.  The incorporation of poorly designed Health Information Technology Systems continue to have negative consequences on patients health.

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surgery-centerTwo recent articles discuss the increased risks of medical practice at surgery centers as they take on increasingly risky surgeries.

A global investigation by Christina Jewett from Kaiser Health News and Mark Alesia from USA Today reveals that since 2013, 260 people died of complications after they went for an in-and-out procedure at a surgery center in America.

Another investigation led by Lindy Washburn from NorthJersey.com found that more than 12,000 serious cases of personal  injury including 52 deaths have occurred in New Jersey surgery centers between September 2008 and September 2017. Additionally Washburn also found out that these numbers were only reflecting a partial reality as among the 298 surgery centers installed in New Jersey only half of them have to report to NJ’s Patient Safety Reporting System. In New Jersey surgical centers with only one room don’t need to report their patient safety data. Previous cases of medmal indicate that some victims died in the past but exact numbers are nowhere to be found. In her article Washburn describes several cases including the one of  Rekhaben Shah, a 67 year old woman who went to one of these centers for a routine colonoscopy and died two days later. A new law was just passed that will soon require all New Jersey surgical centers to report patients safety data.