Kansas City Injury Lawyer Blog

The family of a Florida man who died after receiving the wrong medication at a Florida hospital has filed a lawsuit against the hospital. In July 2010, 79 year-old Richard Smith went to North Shore Medical Center with shortness of breath and was admitted to the ICU. A doctor prescribed the antacid Pepcid, but the nurse administered Pancuronium by mistake. Pancuronium is a muscle relaxant used while intubating hospital patients, but is also used as part of a mixture of drugs in lethal injections.

The nurse had to get the Pancuronium from a locked drug cart in the ICU, while Pepcid is available over-the-counter. News reports do not indicate if the hospital keeps Pepcid in the same area. The nurse apparently injected the Pancuronium into Smith's IV and left. According to University of Miami anesthesiologist Dr. Keith Candiotti, the drug would not cause a patient to lose consciousness but would render them unable to move or breathe in a large enough dose. Smith lay unattended for half an hour, according to hospital records, before staff noticed that he was unresponsive. Smith's son arrived at the hospital shortly afterwards to find his father unconscious. Although Smith was resuscitated, he never regained consciousness and died almost a month later.

According to news reports by Miami's WPLG, the nurse who administered the incorrect medication to Smith still works at the same hospital. He was reprimanded, paid a $2,800 fine, and had to attend "remediation courses." The hospital reported that he had been "appropriately counseled and re-trained." It has reportedly removed Pancuronium from most areas except the operating rooms themselves, and upgraded the medication's packaging to include additional warnings.

Smith's family filed suit in a Miami court in November against North Shore, claiming damages for wrongful death and the loss of Smith's income and support. They particularly note that, in addition to making a mistake, the hospital did not notice their error for thirty minutes, leaving Smith alone that whole time. Smith's family does not feel the punishment meted out so far is enough. Smith and his wife, Lula, had four children of their own and adopted and raised ten other children. She still has care of two children, ages 2 and 10, that they had taken in when the children's mother died.

Continue reading "Man Dies After Accidentally Receiving Drug Used in Executions" »

According to new statistics released by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, traffic accident fatality numbers for the year 2010 fell to record lows, ending at a total of 32,885 fatalities. That was a drop of 2.9% from the previous year, and also the lowest traffic accident fatality numbers on record since 1949. Last year, there was a decline in traffic accident deaths even though Americans drove approximately 46 billion more miles.

Missouri car accident lawyers credit this decline in accident fatalities with a number factors. Many states now have strong anti-drunk driving enforcement campaigns in place, and the numbers of alcohol-related car crashes has been dropping steadily. Additionally, safety campaigns, such as Horn Law's Drive By Example Safety Organization in Kansas City, have helped to increase seat belt use and curb distracted driving.

However, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration also finds that more than 3,000 people were killed last year in accidents related to cell phone use while driving. Overall, 3,092 people were killed in accidents caused when someone was dialing a cell phone, sending or receiving a text message or performing any other activity related to the use of electronic communication devices while driving. The agency used a new measure to tabulate these deaths last year, so there's no way to compare those numbers with those in previous years.

Deaths caused by intoxicated drivers dropped by 4.9% in 2010. However, the number of people being killed in pedestrian accidents, and the number of motorcycle riders killed in accidents increased last year. The decline in pedestrian accidents is especially shocking, since it comes after 4 straight years of declining pedestrian accident death rates.

A multi-vehicle accident on the morning of August 5, 2010 in Gray Summit, Missouri has led the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) to urge states to ban cell phone use while driving. An investigation into the accident by the NTSB concluded that a pickup truck driver's frequent texting while driving, combined with fatigue, led to the accident. Two people lost their lives and thirty-five were injured in a series of collisions involving four vehicles. The pickup truck collided with the back of a semi traveling without a trailer. A school bus going the same direction then struck the pickup truck, and a second school bus struck the lead bus. The pickup truck driver and a passenger on the lead bus died. The NTSB identified multiple factors that led to the crash, but it concluded that distracted driving played a significant role. The pickup truck driver may have sent or received as many as eleven text messages in the eleven minutes preceding the crash.

As a result, the NTSB has recommended that all fifty states and the District of Columbia enact bans on all non-emergency use of portable electronic communications devices, such as cell phones, while driving. It also recommends creating a "high visibility enforcement" campaign consisting of visible and intensive enforcement of the law combined with extensive publicity and outreach. This approach has been very successful with various campaigns by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), such as their campaign to publicize and enforce seat belt laws, "Click It or Ticket."

The NTSB and NHTSA are government agencies established to promote transportation safety through research and publicity. The NTSB lacks the legal authority to create laws on its own, but its recommendations command the attention of lawmakers. It has previously supported various bans on specific uses of cell phones and other devices, including texting and driving, but now it urges a total ban on all talking and texting while behind the wheel.

The NTSB's investigation also found that the driver of the lead school bus was likely distracted by another vehicle on the side of the road, and that the driver of the second bus failed to maintain a safe distance from the first bus. It issued recommendations to the Missouri governor's office to revise safety procedures for the operation of school buses, particularly regarding driver distractions, as well as procedures for emergency evacuations of school buses.

As many as 3,092 traffic fatalities resulted from "distracted driving" in 2010, according to NHTSA estimates. Cell phone use while driving, especially texting, appears to be escalating around the country. The NHTSA estimates that one in a hundred drivers are actively using their cell phones while driving, with younger drivers doing so in even greater numbers. Stemming this tide may prove difficult. Even though 35 states and the District of Columbia have banned texting and driving, the practice continues, possibly increasing at alarming rates.

Continue reading "No More Cell Phone Use While Driving, Recommends the National Transportation Safety Board" »

Lawsuits often arise out of car accidents. People sustain injuries in a crash and need to seek compensation from the person or people responsible. Typically the responsible person is the driver at fault in the accident. Sometimes it is the auto manufacturer if the car had some defect or flaw that caused or contributed to the accident. Sometimes, the injured parties decide to sue everyone in sight, with surprising results. This is what happened to 89 year-old Oregon resident George Hinnenkamp, whose car was stolen and crashed, and who then became the subject of a lawsuit over that crash.

In June 2009, Hinnenkamp was returning to his Lorane Valley home after a trip into town, only to find his 1991 Thunderbird was missing. He reported the car stolen and waited. That night, he received a call from Oregon State Police telling him that his car had been wrecked in an accident involving alcohol. He also learned that the car thief, 35 year-old Joseph Dinwiddie, was someone he occasionally tapped for odd jobs. Dinwiddie went to prison, where he remains today, for driving while intoxicated, two counts of third-degree assault for the injuries to his passengers, and several other charges.

Here's where the story gets interesting. This past summer, the now 91 year-old Hinnenkamp learned that the two passengers from the night of his car's joyride had filed suit against both him and the incarcerated car thief, claiming $145,000 and $75,000 in damages, respectively. One plaintiff, Delano Oscar, claims "sprains or strains" in his back, neck, and elsewhere. In addition to $1,000 in medical bills, he is seeking $48,000 in non-economic damages, which usually refers to compensation for a plaintiff's pain and suffering. The other plaintiff, Nicole Cunningham, claims similar injuries as well as pelvic fractures, headaches, and dizziness. She is demanding $20,000 in medical bills plus $125,000 in non-economic damages.

The passengers allege in their lawsuits that, on the night of the crash, Dinwiddie was acting as Hinnenkamp's employee and had Hinnenkamp's permission to use the car. This issue had apparently come up during the criminal investigation and prosecution of the theft and crash. Hinnenkamp had told investigators that he had occasionally allowed Dinwiddie to use the car while performing odd jobs. Even Dinwiddie reportedly told police that night that he did not have permission to use the vehicle. The issue of whether Dinwiddie was performing job duties the night of the accident still does not explain the presence of alcohol.

Continue reading "Car Owner Sued by Passengers of Car Thief After Accident" »

The Springfield News-Leader recently reported on the tragic story of a 34 year-old man who hung himself while hospitalized for depression. Hospitals call this a "never event," a tragedy that normally should not happen in a health care facility. This could also include major medication errors, surgeries performed incorrectly or on the wrong patient, or a death during an otherwise ordinary procedure. The man's father reached a confidential settlement with the hospital over his son's death, but also says he never received an apology from the hospital. His case illustrates the problem of tracking and obtaining information on such "never events" in hospitals in Missouri.

Few states require reporting of adverse events by hospital and other medical providers, with most having a system of voluntary reporting. Few states allow public disclosure of data related to any such reports, making it difficult for people injured due to medication errors and other hospital mishaps to obtain information they may need to protect their rights.

Hospitals and other providers have generally fought efforts to mandate reporting and to make information available to the public. Concerns over liability, and of course litigation, lead the objections. An official with the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) describes a "no-blame culture" that encourages voluntary reporting of errors by removing the immediate fear of liability. It would seem that any reports or documentation that contain information relevant to a specific patient's claim for damages ought to be subject to discovery by an attorney. Patient privacy laws may hinder error reporting, as medical providers cannot disclose confidential patient information except in specific circumstances. Safeguards exist, however, that would allow reporting without violating such laws.

Both federal and state laws have attempted to address these issues. While they may have made positive steps towards greater patient safety, they still do not allow access to information that could help an injured patient, nor do they help the government analyze broad samples of data. The federal Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005 (PSQIA) was intended to provide for widespread sharing of error information by medical providers and government officials. The law allowed the designation of patient safety organizations (PSO's) in each state to collect data from hospitals and other providers on adverse events and unsafe conditions. The PSQIA does not allow disclosure of any of this information to the public, and any disclosure is strictly regulated. It also does not require reporting of errors, instead making all reporting voluntary. The AHRQ is supposed to review data collected by the PSO's, but with only voluntary reporting it cannot perform any sort of meaningful analysis.

Continue reading "Few Resources Available for Tracking Missouri Hospital Errors" »