All surgeries have certain risks to them. Consequently, having a surgery can be a very scary thing for a person. Given this, one could imagine how horrible it would be to undergo a surgery and then find out after it is finished that you will have to go to the operating table again because a mistake was made. Sadly, this terrible scenario is a reality for some surgical negligence victims here in Ohio. One type of surgical error that can require a patient to have to undergo an additional surgery is when a doctor mistakenly operates on the wrong body part during a procedure. Individuals who have been the victim of such a surgical mistake may be able to seek compensation for the harms it caused by bringing a malpractice suit.
Recently, a malpractice case involving the above-mentioned type of surgical mistake has come up in another state, North Dakota.
The case involves a rib removal surgery a woman says she underwent in February 2013. The woman alleges that the wrong rib was taken out during this surgery and that she consequently required a second surgery. She says that she experienced disability, pain, suffering and emotional distress as a result of this.
The woman and her husband have brought a medical malpractice lawsuit in a federal court against the doctor who they claim made the mistake in the first surgery. According to the article on WBNS-10TV’s website which reported this story, the doctor in question is the head of a university medical school’s surgical department.
Source: WBNS-10TV, “Federal suit accuses Fargo surgeon of malpractice,” March 1, 2014