Settlement:
$825,000 for plaintiff in 2016
Court: Supreme Court, New York County
Plaintiff’s Counsel: Eric Turkewitz
Summary:
This case concerned a failure to properly treat a simple abrasion in the eye that resulted from a 27 year-old woman falling asleep with her contacts in after a difficult day. She presented to the emergency room of a private Manhattan hospital with eye pain and was seen by a physician assistant. But the physician assistant prescribed the wrong antibiotic, and failed to schedule the patient for a follow-up within 24 hours.
When the patient finally returned to the hospital, her abrasion had become worse, and her cornea was ulcerated. She was left with a permanent scar on her cornea that affects her ability to see clearly, with symptoms of blurriness and starbursts (at night).
The defense was prepared to argue that they did not cause the initial injury, that the patient was non-compliant with directions given, and that she would have had a scar anyway. The plaintiff would have responded that the directions the physician assistant claimed to have given the patient were never recorded in the hospital chart. The matter settled in April 2016 for $825,000.
Other eye injury cases:
$2.2M – Queens Medical Malpractice — Childbirth — Infant’s Cornea Damaged By Forceps — Partial Loss Of Vision In One Eye
For negligent injury to a child’s eye during childbirth (1996), resulting in reduced vision in the eye and forceps marks next to the eye. The $2.2M birth injury recovery in Queens was a structured payout over many years, which had a present value of $750K.
$450K – New York Medical Malpractice — Failure To Promptly Treat Eye Infection After Cataract Surgery — Blindness In One Eye
For a 77-year-old New York woman due to a negligent failure to diagnose and treat an infection in the left eye, leading to blindness in the eye.
$215K – Rockland Medical Malpractice — Anesthesia Injection Before Cataract Surgery — Choroidal Hemorrhage And Detached Retina
Recovery for this Rockland patient who suffered a detached retina, after an anesthesia injection ruptured the globe of her eye prior to cataract surgery
