RESULTS: $3.5 Million Jury Verdict
COURT: Hampton, Virginia Circuit Court
DATE: 2013
ATTORNEY: James (Jim) St. Clair
WHAT HAPPENED:
Our client was an 18-year-old who visited her family doctor’s office due to unusual tingling down her right arm and because her tongue felt like it was asleep. She also reported that she could not feel her right leg. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) testing plainly indicated and reported that the 18-year-old had suffered symptoms of an acute stroke. Although the family doctor practice received the results of the MRI the same day, the only instructions that the 18-year-old got from the PCP practice was to follow up with the practice the following day. Prior to the next day’s appointment, the 18-year-old suffered a catastrophic second stroke later on the day of her visit to the family practice. The stroke left her with right-side paralysis, and she lost the majority of her eyesight vision for vision on her right periphery.
LEGAL STRATEGIES:
In any medical malpractice case in Virginia involving a physician, we must locate a doctor in the same or similar field as the doctor who missed or failed to determine the proper diagnosis. In this case, Jim St. Clair obtained all pertinent medical records by subpoena and medical authorizations. After carefully reviewing the records, Attorney St. Clair sought out and located a family practice expert physician who could analyze all the records and give an opinion as to whether the family doctor violated the relevant medical standards of care.
The family doctor expert reviewed all of the medical records that touched on these issues and testified that the MRI had indicated that the plaintiff suffered an acute stroke and that the standard of medical care required that she be immediately transferred to an emergency room on the day of her visit. Our expert further testified that the second stroke suffered that afternoon or evening could have been prevented entirely if she had been sent to the emergency room immediately after a proper diagnosis based on the MRI results.
Many consumers have heard of “stroke-busting” medications. Currently, as of 2024, there is more than one type of stroke-busting” medication used in hospital emergency rooms and at other urgent care facilities to treat strokes. For example, according to the American Stroke Association:
Alteplase, the current standard of care for stroke, is administered by injection followed by an hour-long infusion and has been FDA-approved for treating clot-caused strokes since 1996. Tenecteplase is a newer-generation medication administered by a single injection into a blocked blood vessel. Both drugs are approved for use in dissolving clots in blocked heart arteries, and tenecteplase is sometimes used off-label to treat ischemic strokes. The latest [2024] ischemic stroke treatment guidelines from the American Heart Association recommend it might be reasonable to consider tenecteplase for ischemic stroke in select patients. Several recent clinical trials focused on ischemic stroke have directly compared alteplase and tenecteplase, however, large, Phase 3 trials are still ongoing.
During this particular failure-to-diagnose stroke medical malpractice case litigation, Attorney St. Clair conducted numerous depositions and marshaled and synthesized all of the appropriate evidence, but the family practice doctor and his lawyers still refused to settle the case.
THE RESULTS: $3.5 Million Jury Verdict
A long civil jury trial was required in Hampton Circuit Court, but the jury returned a verdict of $3.5 million in favor of the young client. (Due to the Virginia medical malpractice cap or ceiling that applied, the judge reduced the verdict to $2 million, and the cap on damages was then in effect).