Ohio Medical Malpractice Wrongful Death Lawsuit Alleges Hospital Gave Too High Dose Of Antibiotics, For Too Long, To Patient

An Ohio medical malpractice wrongful death lawsuit filed on July 6, 2026 in the Ohio Court of Common Pleas alleges, in part:

8. On June 11, 2024, Decedent was admitted to Mercy West for evaluation of stroke-like symptoms. During that admission, she was diagnosed with bilateral pulmonary emboli and underwent thrombectomy. She was discharged on June 14, 2024.
9. On June 17, 2024, Decedent was readmitted to Mercy West with shortness of breath. She was diagnosed with NSTEMI (non-ST elevation myocardial infarction) and multifocal pneumonia.
10. At admission on June 17, 2024, Decedent’s renal function was documented in her chart as Chronic Kidney Disease Stage 3b, with a creatinine of 1.6 and a creatinine clearance of approximately 36 mL/min.
11. At admission, Defendants ordered and administered cefepime, an intravenous antibiotic cleared by the kidneys, at a dose of 2,000 mg every 12 hours.
12. The FDA-approved label for cefepime requires dose reduction for patients with impaired renal function. For a patient with Decedent’s renal function (CrCl 30-60 mL/min), the recommended dose is 1,000 mg every 24 hours. The dose administered to Decedent was four times the recommended dose at admission.
13. The hospital’s electronic health record system generated a Best Practice Advisory (“BPA”) alert when the cefepime order was placed, warning of inappropriate dosing for the patient’s renal function. The BPA alert was overridden by a healthcare provider whose identity is presently unknown.
14. By June 21, 2024, Decedent’s renal function had further declined to a creatinine clearance of approximately 23-24 mL/min. At this level of renal function, the dose being administered was approximately eight times the FDA-recommended dose.
15. On June 21, 2024, three separate warnings were documented in Decedent’s medical record concerning the cefepime administration:
    a. A nurse (identified in the record as Jayden Wessell, RN) contacted the attending physician (Dr. Webster) with concerns of Decedent “developing metabolic encephalopathy from the high doses of cefepime.” Dr. Webster verbalized that this was likely and instructed the nurse to notify pharmacy.
    b. The same nurse spoke face-to-face with a pharmacist (“Don”), who confirmed that Decedent’s creatinine and clearance were too high to be receiving the 2,000 mg IV doses. The dose was reduced to 1,000 mg IV- still approximately four times the FDA-recommended dose for Decedent’s renal function.
    c. The nephrology consulting service documented that Decedent was exhibiting myoclonus (involuntary muscle jerking), a known sign of cefepime neurotoxicity, and recommended switching to a different antibiotic.
16. Despite these warnings, cefepime continued to be administered at a dosage exceeding the FDA-recommended dose for Decedent’s renal function for an additional three days.
17. Between June 21 and June 24, 2024, Decedent developed progressive encephalopathy consistent with cefepime-induced neurotoxicity, including but not limited to: inability to follow commands, inability to speak, rigidity, dorsiflexion of the feet, moaning, and crying.
18. On June 24, 2024, a percutaneous coronary intervention (“PCI”) procedure that had been scheduled to treat Decedent’s critical coronary artery disease was cancelled because Decedent was unable to follow commands or communicate. A nurse in the catheterization laboratory documented that Decedent “arrived to cath lab awake and moaning. Patient does not follow commands or appear to focus when name called. Patient not talking.”
19. The cancelled PCI was never rescheduled. Decedent died with untreated critical coronary artery disease. The neurology consulting service evaluated Decedent on June 24, 2024 and identified cefepime as the most likely cause of the encephalopathy. The neurology service did not enter an adverse reaction or allergy notation for cefepime in Decedent’s chart.
20. Following discontinuation of cefepime on or about June 24, 2024, Decedent’s mental status improved over the following days. More than twenty separate providers documented Decedent during the period of June 25 through July 5, 2024 as alert, oriented, conversational, and able to make her own medical decisions.
21. On July 5, 2024, the infectious disease consulting service documented at 9:05 AM that Decedent had completed her antibiotic course. At 9:31 AM, the attending hospitalist documented Decedent as alert and oriented, eating breakfast, with no antibiotics on her medication list.
22. On the afternoon of July 5, 2024, an unidentified provider restarted cefepime at 2,000 mg loading dose followed by 1,000 mg every 12 hours, despite Decedent’s renal function (CrCl 19-25 mL/min), despite the lack of any allergy or adverse reaction flag in her chart, despite no documented clinical indication consistent with cefepime’s spectrum of activity, and despite the prior cefepime-induced encephalopathy.
23. Early in the morning of July 6, 2024, Decedent was found unresponsive in pulseless electrical activity (‘PEA’) cardiac arrest. The attending cardiologist documented at 12:52 PM on July 6 that the arrest demonstrated ‘no ventricular dysrhythmia,’ indicating a metabolic rather than primary cardiac etiology.
24. Decedent was pronounced dead at 10:40 PM on July 6, 2024. Cefepime was infusing at the time of her death.
25. On August 18, 2024-forty-three days after Decedent’s death- the attending hospitalist, Brian F. Webster, MD, signed the discharge summary for Decedent’s admission. The discharge summary states: ‘Aspiration Pneumonia – Pt aspirated early am 07/05/2024-Continue Vancomycin and Cefepime.’
26. No contemporaneous note written on July 5, 2024 by any provider documents any aspiration event on that date. Multiple notes from July 5, 2024 document Decedent as alert, oriented, eating, drinking, and signing consent forms.
27. All references to aspiration in Decedent’s admission were made on or after July 6, 2024, following Decedent’s cardiac arrest. Critical care physician Adam P. Kouns, MD documented at 9:10 AM on July 6 that aspiration was ‘suspect’ as the cause of the arrest, based on interpretation of a post-arrest chest X-ray. Dr. Webster documented at 12:35 PM on July 6, 2024: ‘Pt aspirated early am 07/05/2024.’ Neither notation is corroborated by any July 5, 2024 clinical documentation.
28. Throughout the admission, Decedent’s medical record contained the false notation “history of intravenous drug abuse,” despite Decedent never having used intravenous drugs in her life. This and other inaccurate notations in her chart materially affected the care provided.

Source

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