Medical Malpractice Attorneys

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Stroke Malpractice Case in Queens

These are the facts of a medical malpractice case that our office handled involving a failure to timely diagnose and treat carotid artery stenosis, which resulted in a rather severe stroke in a woman who was about 51 years of age. She had a past medical history of hypertension, asthma, diabetes and arterial sclerosis. She also had a past history of an angioplasty with stent replacement two times which ultimately failed and lead led to a cardiac double bypass operation.

The patient was under the care of a treating cardiologist from the time of her double bypass operation forward. On June 5, the patient called her cardiologists office and insisted on an emergency visit. The following day she met the doctor at his office. At that time, an EKG was performed and read as normal for her. The doctor increased her dosage of medication Paxil. No Ct-scan or sonogram was performed or ordered and there was no examination of her carotid arteries either by stethoscope or Doppler studies. The patient’s complaints at the time were of weakness and balance problems and were diagnosed as psychological.

During depositions in the case, her treating doctor admitted that numbness, slurring of speech and dizziness can all be manifestations of transient ischemic attacks or a precursor to a stroke. Further that the patient had risk factors associated with stroke such as, hypertension, diabetes, hypercholesterolemia, smoking, obesity, and sedentary life.

The patient return home with her husband and continued with the same symptoms for a couple of days but on June 11 got markedly worse. She was taken to the emergency room of the local hospital. In the emergency room, a Doppler study and ct-scan were performed which both indicated that she had carotid artery stenosis and that a stroke had occurred. She remained at the hospital for about four or five days and then was discharged.

At the time of her admission to a local hospital a plan was arrived at which would require an operation to be performed called an endarterectomy. The operation could not be immediately performed because at the time she had a fresh stroke. Approximately 6 weeks later while awaiting for the endarterectomy procedure patient suffered a second stroke, which was significantly worse than the first.

The patient sustained significant cognitive difficulties, had paralysis on the right side and quite a bit of difficulty in speaking. She was almost completely disabled and dependent upon her husband for all activities of daily living.

If you or a loved one has medical malpractice questions in New York, please contact the medical malpractice attorneys of Silberstein, Awad & Miklos, serving clients in Nassau and Suffolk Counties and Brooklyn, the Bronx and Queens, Staten Island and Westchester County.

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Silberstein, Awad & Miklos, P.C.
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