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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In New York the statute of limitations for medical malpractice starts from the time the medical error occurred. Assemblywoman Helene Weinstein (D-Brooklyn) is sponsoring a bill that would start the statute of limitations from the time the medical error is discovered instead of the the time it occurred. The bill, named after Lavern Wilkinson, a mother who died of a curable form of lung cancer after doctors misdiagnosed her (see previous blog), has 38 Senate Sponsors , both Republican and Democrats according to Assemblywoman Weinstein. This is enough to pass as long as the Senate decides to take the bill to a vote this year. The time is ticking on the bill as there is only one week left before the session ends. Read more in New York CBS Local.

Our partner, New York Medical Malpractice Attorney Jeffrey Bloom is strongly supporting the bill. Jeff is representing Lissy MacMahon, a single mother of a 15 year old son who was recently diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. Lissy had a previous surgery in 2012 in a New York Hospital. At the time of the surgery, doctors failed to diagnose her cancer. When she visited our office, Lissy learned that she was unable to sue because the statute of limitations had passed despite the fact that she had just learned about her cancer.  Lavern’s Law if it passed would allow Lissy to commence her lawsuit and make sure she and her son are taken care of.  Jeff traveled to Albany to support Lissy and many others who could benefit from the passage of this law. Below is a video of Lissy that will be shown to all New York State legislators.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ot9MSGkcLbw

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jbOur partner, New York Medical Malpractice Attorney Jeff Bloom is helping our client Elissa McMahon in her crusade to get Lavern’s law passed (see previous post).  After she discovered that doctors in a New York hospital failed to diagnose cancer, Elissa McMahon was unable to bring a lawsuit because the statute of limitations had passed. In New York the statute of limitations for victims of medical malpractice starts at the time of the occurrence of the medical error. Lavern’s Law is a proposal to have the statute of limitations start at the time of the discovery of the error. This law would allow patients like our client, Elissa McMahon, to bring a lawsuit against the hospital which failed to diagnose her cancer. Most States in the US have similar laws. New York State is one of only six States to start the statute of limitations at the time of the occurrence of the error. Talking about Elissa McMahon’s case, Jeffrey Bloom told the NY Daily News “How could she possibly not have a right to bring a lawsuit when the statute of limitations ran (out) before she even knew she was sick?”

In 2012 Elissa McMahon went to Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City for a fibroid removal. At the time of the surgery, pathology slides from Lenox Hill Hospital clearly indicated that the patient had cancer but doctors failed to diagnose it. Two years later she went to a doctor after suffering from severe back pain. She was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. 6 months later she consulted with our firm and discovered that the statute of limitations had passed and that she was unable to sue. Our partner Jeffrey Bloom is now helping Elissa McMahon in her battle to change the law and get justice. If the law goes through in the next session Elissa McMahon, a 46 year old single mother of a teenage son, will be able to bring a lawsuit. If it doesn’t pass this session she will have to wait until next year. She has stage 4 metastatic cancer and told the News “Even if my son can’t benefit from this, there are other people in similar situations.”

Below is a video of Elissa McMahon in which she discusses her tragic situation with Jeffrey Bloom. Jeff traveled to Albany in support of Elissa and others in her situation to push for the passage of Lavern’s Law. It is a travesty that the Republican’s in the legislature have been blocking this law.

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Victims of medical malpractice in New York have 15 months to file a lawsuit against a public hospital and 2 and half years  to sue a private hospital or a physician after a medical error occurred. This rule is unfair to the many patients who only discover that they have been the victim of a medical malpractice after the statute of limitations has passed. For example if a doctor fails to diagnose cancer, it can take several years until the misdiagnosis is discovered. The patient is then left without any possibility to sue and get compensated for the medical error.

Patient advocates strongly believe that the statute of limitations should start at the time of the discovery of the medical error instead of starting at the time of the occurrence of the medical error.

Last week a coalition of 33 organizations sent a letter to Governor Cuomo and the New York State legislative leaders asking them to take the appropriate measures to pass the so called Lavern’s law. The law, named after Lavern Wilkinson, proposes to start  the statute of limitations  at the time of the discovery of the medical error. Lavern Wilkinson died of a curable form of lung cancer in 2013 after being misdiagnosed in 2010.  Lavern was diagnosed with cancer while in terminal phase. The statute of limitations had passed and she was unable to sue for the medical malpractice and get compensated. She left behind a 15 year old autistic child who requires 24 hour attention and care.

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jbNew York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Jeffrey Bloom will be speaking at the New York City Bar Seminar “Current Issues in New York Medical Malpractice”. This program features a multi-disciplinary view of the current state of medical malpractice in New York, including regulatory concerns for the admitted professional liability insurers, techniques for judicial intervention in resolving malpractice claims; and recent changes in the law affecting the scope of the duties owed by physicians and hospitals. The program will highlight recent legislative developments and the prospect for further changes in the malpractice liability environment. Jeffrey will be speaking on the impact of the recent and proposed legislative changes on litigation of medical claims.  The event will take place this Monday May 23rd from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm at 42 West 44th Street, New York, NY 10036. For more information or to register to this event click here.

Jeffrey Bloom is a partner at Gair, Gair, Conason, Rubinowitz, Bloom, Hershenhorn, Steigman & Mackauf. In addition to trying and managing medical malpractice cases, Jeffrey Bloom is the Co-chair of the Medical Malpractice Committee of the New York State Trial Lawyers Association as well as the Co-Chair of LAWPAC New York, the Trial Lawyers political action committee. In these roles, he works to protect the rights of victims of medical malpractice in Albany with the Legislature and State government.

 

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Our partners, New York Medical Malpractice Lawyers Ben Rubinowitz and Jeffrey Bloom appeared this morning on Good Morning America to discuss the settlement that they reached in the Joan Rivers malpractice case. See video below

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Our law firm is pleased to announce that our attorneys Jeffrey Bloom and Ben Rubinowitz were successful in resolving the Joan Rivers Medical Malpractice case on behalf of her family. The amount is confidential.

Here is the statement from Melissa Rivers in regards to this settlement:

“In accepting this settlement, I am able to put the legal aspects of my mother’s death behind me and ensure that those culpable for her death have accepted responsibility for their actions quickly and without equivocation.  Moving forward, my focus will be to ensure that no one ever has to go through what my mother, Cooper and I went through and I will work towards ensuring higher safety standards in out-patient surgical clinics. I want to express my personal gratitude to my legal team for their wise counsel and prompt resolution of this case. ”

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medical-malpracticeIf you learn that your doctor was sued for medical malpractice, should you immediately change doctors? A recent article in Consumer Reports  explains how patients can find information about their doctor and what they should do about it.

Not every doctor who was sued for medical malpractice is a bad doctor.  Consumer Reports talked to Michelle M. Mello, a Professor of Law and of Health Research and Policy  at the Stanford University School of Medicine. Mello is an expert on the medical malpractice system, medical error and patient safety. She told Consumer Reports that very often medical malpractice lawsuits “are not the best indicator of substandard care” for several reasons.  For example:

  • The lawsuit may settle before a trial without the doctor admitting his error
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220px-Surgeons_at_Work251,000 people died from medical error in the US in 2013. This was the third highest cause of death that year  in the US after cancer (585,000) and heart disease (611,000) according to estimates calculated by Martin A Makary, professor and Michael Daniel, research fellow at the Department of Surgery of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21287, USA.

In a recent article published in the British Medical Journal, Martin Makary and Michael Daniel explain the difficulty of obtaining the exact numbers of people dying from medical malpractice in the US and how they “analyzed the scientific literature on medical error to identify its contribution to US deaths in relation to causes listed by the CDC“.

Every year the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)  compiles data from death certificates to prepare statistics related to causes of death in the U.S. On death certificates the cause of the death is coded according to an International Classification of Disease (ICD). The CDC is using the ICD codes to prepare its yearly statistics but these codes do not capture human or system errors.  Deaths certificates from patients dying in hospitals will list a medical condition but not a medical error.

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prescription drugThe fear of providing lawyers with new weapons for medical malpractice lawsuits and the idea that the FDA wants to tell doctors how to practice medicine are among the many reasons why most physicians are still opposed to mandatory training for prescription of painkillers .  In 2012 a recommendation by an expert panel to implement such training was rejected by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The American Medical Association was also against the recommendation.

However since 2012 the opiate addiction problem in the US grew so big that the government is looking at all possible solutions to fight this crisis. The role of the doctor is again taking center stage as, Today and tomorrow, the FDA is convening a new panel of experts to discuss the possibility of mandatory training for physicians prescribing opiates (see briefing document for the meeting).

The Obama administration and even some drug manufacturers have now stated that they wareere in favor of such mandatory training but other organizations such as the American Medical Association Task Force to Reduce Prescription Opioid Abuse are still against it.

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operarting roomA fire erupted in a New York hospital operating room while a patient was having surgery. The accident happened in 2014 at  NYU Langone Medical Center but the results of the investigation were only recently released by the New York Department of Health. The report was obtained by the NY Post under a Freedom of Information Law request. In the report State investigators indicate that the hospital lacked adequate safety procedures to prevent surgical fire. NYU Langone Medical Center also was not conforming with standard practices to protect patients from these type of fires.

Additional medical malpractice was also committed by the surgeon  and the anesthesiologist who failed to communicate proprely about which instrument would be used by the surgeon and which gas would be used by the anesthesiologist to check if there was incompatibility or danger.  According to the DOH report the surgeon used an instrument that sparked a fire in presence of the oxygen used by the anesthesiologist. The patient was injured but the the extent of the injury was redacted in the report received by the NY Post.

After  the accident happened at the beginning of December 2014 the hospital didn’t act to improve safety measures to prevent patients from being injured in a similar manner. It was only after the the Department of Health inspection, at the end of the same month, that the hospital instituted new safety measures related to operating room fires. The measures included changing the oxygen delivery method for surgeries posing a high risk of fire.