Georgia Court of Appeals Upholds $9.2 Million Wrongful Death Judgment
Compensation in a Georgia personal injury case is broadly divided into two categories: Economic damages and non-economic damages. The key difference between the two is that economic damages come with a price tag that is relatively simple to determine. For instance, if you are injured in a car accident, the sum of your medical bills are a form of economic damages.
Non-economic damages, however, are not so easy to quantify. We often use terms like “pain and suffering” and “emotional distress” to describe non-economic damages. Obviously, it is impossible to assign a fixed price to someone’s pain or trauma. So when a personal injury case goes to trial, it is generally left to a jury to decide what is an appropriate amount of non-economic damages for a given case.
Failure to Order CT Proved Costly for Georgia Patient
Georgia legislators have tried restricting (or “capping”) non-economic damages in some cases. In 2005, the legislature enacted OCGA § 51-13-1, which capped non-economic damages at $350,000 in any “medical malpractice action, including an action for wrongful death” brought against a health care provider. In 2010, however, the Georgia Supreme Court held this cap was unconstitutional, as it violated a medical malpractice’s constitutional right to a jury trial.
More recently, the Georgia Court of Appeals refused to revive the cap in a medical malpractice case involving wrongful death. The case before the Court, The Medical Center of Central Georgia v. Turner, involved the death of a man due to complications from surgery to remove a polyp from his intestines.
Essentially, what happened was that the defendant physicians failed to order a CT scan prior to conducting the surgery. It subsequently turned out the victim’s condition was much worse than the doctors knew. Not only did the victim have a large cancerous tumor that also needed to be removed, but the primary vessel supplying blood to his intestines–known as the superior mesentery artery (SMA)–had shifted to an “abnormal place.” One of the surgeons accidentally cut the MSA, and subsequent complications from this mistake led to the victim’s death.
The victim’s daughter subsequently filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the two surgeons and their employer, alleging wrongful death and medical malpractice. The crux of the case was that had the defendants ordered a CT, they would have known about the shifted MSA before going into surgery. A jury agreed the providers were negligent and awarded the daughter $9.2 million in damages, which included $7.2 million in non-economic damages.
On appeal, the defendants challenged both the verdict and insisted the judge should have applied the $350,000 cap on non-economic damages, which is still on the books despite the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision. The defense’s position was that the 2010 case only applied to cases involving medical malpractice and not wrongful death. The Court of Appeals rejected that attempt to split hairs and upheld the entire verdict.
Contact Hawkins Spizman Trial Lawyers Today
A wrongful death lawsuit can never undo the damage done to your family. But it can give you a sense of justice to hold the persons responsible for your loved one’s death accountable in a court of law. Our Atlanta personal injury lawyers can advise you on claims related to medical malpractice, nursing home negligence, and wrongful death. Contact Hawkins Spizman Trial Lawyers today. We serve clients throughout Georgia including Atlanta, Dunwoody, Alpharetta, Cobb County, Fulton County, Gwinnett County, Johns Creek and Sandy Springs.
Source:
efast.gaappeals.us/download?filingId=83fa5454-eefd-4f84-a6de-d8d8ac180b22
