$2.6 Million Verdict For Botched Cardiac Catheterization: On May 25, 2023, an Indiana medical malpractice jury returned its verdict in the amount of $2,670,000 in favor of a woman who suffered a serious injury to her leg as a result of a cardiac catheterization procedure in 2012 that took place at the now closed St. Joseph Hospital (the Indiana medical malpractice lawsuit was filed in 2014).
The plaintiff alleged in her Indiana medical malpractice lawsuit that the physician who performed the procedure negligently left a polymer in an artery in her right leg. She had intense pain in her right calf during the days immediately following the procedure and called the physician’s office, which never advised her to come to the office for evaluation. Three days after the procedure, the woman went to a hospital emergency room where she underwent surgery during which was found a small amount of glistening foreign material in an artery in her right leg. The surgeon made two attempts to restore blood flow through the artery but his efforts failed.
The plaintiff alleged that the substance caused her artery to become occluded and that she developed at least one blood clot. It was subsequently determined the substance had been left in the plaintiff’s femoral artery before it traveled to another artery and became lodged.
The plaintiff’s Indiana medical malpractice lawsuit alleged that her right leg is so disfigured that it causes her great embarrassment: “Both the strength and sensation in her right lower extremity are greatly diminished. She has a right foot drop and has been fitted with an AFO (ankle foot-orthosis) to lessen the symptoms associated with the foot drop when she walks. Her right leg is constantly swollen. Her activities of daily life have been significantly impaired by the deficits in her right leg.”
Cardiac Catheterization
Cardiac catheterization is one of the most widely performed cardiac procedures. In the United States, more than 1,000,000 cardiac catheterization procedures are performed annually. As expected in any invasive procedure, there are some patient-related and procedure-related complications. With significant advances in the equipment used for cardiac catheterization, the improved skill of the operators, and newer techniques, the rates of these complications have been reduced significantly. The term cardiac catheterization can refer to either right heart catheterization or left heart catheterization, or both. The procedure can be either diagnostic or therapeutic, and interventional cardiologists can perform a variety of interventions depending on the clinical need.
The risk of major complications during diagnostic cardiac catheterization procedure is usually less than 1%, and the risk and the risk of mortality of 0.05% for diagnostic procedures. For any patient, the complication rate is dependent on multiple factors and is dependent on the demographics of the patient, vascular anatomy, co-morbid conditions, clinical presentation, the procedure being performed, and the experience of the operator. The complications can be minor as discomfort at the site of catheterization, to major ones like death.
If you or a loved one may have been injured (or worse) as a result of a negligently performed cardiac catheterization in the United States, you should promptly find a medical malpractice lawyer in your state who may investigate your cardiac catheterization medical malpractice claim for you and represent you or your loved one in a cardiac catheterization medical malpractice case, if appropriate.
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