I see no reason to compensate the woman. I don’t even know what the problem is. There was no harm done. It was an internal organ- if he burned “UK” onto her arm I would say otherwise. And the organ was removed! I wouldn’t find it offensive if he ate her uterus while he was at it, if the woman didn’t want to keep it for herself, of course.
Think about it this way- would it be ok if he wrote the letters on AFTER he removed it? It seems to me that what he did added no danger whatsoever, and when he actually wrote the letters on is unimportant.
IMHO, the doctor is technically guilty of the tort of “battery” – harmful or offensive contact, not consented to by the victim.
Of course, the victim of a battery is generally permitted to sue for nominal + punitive damages, even if there is “no harm done.”
IMHO, this is a good rule. There are many analogous situations where there is “no harm done” but it still seems reasonable to make the wrongdoer pay money to the victim. For example, if you spit in somebody’s face or pinch their behind.
I also note that insurance generally does not cover punitive damages.
I’d agree that any non-medically necessary time under the knife should be compensatable. I don’t care that the organ in question was being removed. If it was necessary/fun/whatever for him to ‘mark’ it, then do so after she’s been stiched back up.
I have a difficult time understanding anyone who doesn’t think there was ‘harm done’. Remember the doctor who left his patient open while he went to the bank? that was considered actionable. Same sort of issue (left open for non medical reason).
wring, there is a huge difference between leaving someone under for however long it takes to go to the bloody bank and the fifteen seconds or so it would take to cauterize a couple of letters in. There’s also the issue of possibly leaving a patient with no MD in the room, which is a distinct problem should said patient crash. Leaving a patient without proper medical supervision for an extended period of time is indeed actionable, as in many states it constitutes abondonment. Standing there for a few extra seconds is a very different story.
Oh, and Dave, according to the Herald-Leader two women have come forward. That doesn’t quite rate as several in my book. The picture of the initials also shows the vertical line of the “K” extending above the rest of the lettering, which makes me think there was some other reason to be cauterizing. I also noticed that the bit with the lettering on it looks rather like a little basketball.
Actually the quote was “at least two”…I extrapolate that to “several”, which was only used as a reponse to your “well maybe the cautery was on the blink” line of thinking.
You do recognize, both from the picture and the numbers…that this was not a case of
“maybe the electrocautery was acting up, or had been earlier in the day. When our machine was acting up, the vet would often “test” it on whatever we were going to remove before actually proceding with the removal.” ?
I really think they should pull his MD permanently, Garnish his earnings for the rest of his life and bankrupt the insurance company to ensure that this never happens again. I can see no reason for there ever to be a joke cracked or an instants hesitation during surgery. If the doctor can’t go all day or however long he needs to do an operation with stern and compassionate demeanor, then they should not be a MD or in an operating room. We need to slow the rate of operations down to what only the most stoic Doctors can handle. Tension relief is to be afford only at the lawyers behest and only by pre surgery written permission from the patient. I think the whole thing about BAD Doctors is wrapped up in this perfect example of what is wrong with the medical filed. We need to send a strong message to the profession that their ass is grass if they act in any way human or need to smile or laugh to help get through the day.
I would like to hear the sounds of laughter and ridicule that goes along with this clowns surgery and see what all the other people in the room do. Do they take this fool to task for his ways? Why not? Even if it is done in 4.23 seconds and is just a habit of his style of doing surgery, it is not to be tolerated.
Well, I sure wouldn’t want Dr. Chuckles operating on me. The guy’s actions were grossly insensitive. At the very least, the hospital should take some kind of disciplinary action towards him. How can patients have confidence in the hospital if they know that its surgeons screw around while performing surgeries?
yes, CCL I understand there’s a difference between leaving the room and having the patient open for ‘a bit longer’.
However.
Doctor has no right to do anything other than what is medically necessary and/or what he and the patient have agreed to. ANy surgury has an inherant risk associated w/it. you minimize the exposure of a patient to the risk. The fact that (apparently) in your eyes and his eyes, the additional ‘risk’ wasn’t significant isn’t an issue. The person who has the sole right to determine if the ‘risk’ is significant is the person who is undertaking the risk.
and simply put, no doctor has the right to increase (however slightly) the risk to their patient, in order to ‘have fun’ play a joke etc.
again, if, for whatever purposes he desired/wished/needed/thought were good he wanted those intials on the uterus, do it after it’s left the patients body.
This situation is a really great law school hypo for a torts class, by the way.
Was there the “harmful or offensive touching” necessary to constitute a battery when the woman wasn’t harmed (or was she?–extra time under the knife is bad as many posters have said) or offended at the time of the touching? If I remember correctly from first year torts, I think common law holds that a battery occurs even if the plaintiff didn’t know about it at the time.
If it’s the first month or so of class, you could ask if it could be common law assault, but it clearly wasn’t because the plaintiff did not apprehend anything.
Also, I believe that some states require a physical injury to recover for emotional distress. Was the woman physically injured during the time between the cauterizing of the initials and the removal of the organ, or does the fact that the whole purpose of the operation was to remove the organ mean that no physical injury occurred?
if you saw the video it looked like he was doing SOMETHING legitimate at first, as it looks like he turned some sort of line he had already drawn into the K, then made the U as an afterthought.
it sort of looks like he made a mark for some offical reason that happened to look like a k or a pratial k and then he just quickly added the U. it looked like he was marking it for some real reason and not just for fun
I asked my buddy, the OB/GYN surgeon and head of the department at the local hospital about this when I saw it today.
Some Doctors are taught to mark the uterus for arteries and orientation and such. His markings were not appropriate in my friend’s opinion and he deserves to get spanked for his actions.
The story in the local paper today says that the Dr. was marking the organ for orientation purposes, which many surgeons do so as not to cut in the wrong place, and found that using “UK” helped him keep his bearings, so to speak. He also said he used it because he was a proud alumnus.
On the other hand, the woman claims she asked him why he did it via a certified letter back in November and he never responded to her inquiry.
[sub]Why are we always in the news with this kind of stuff??[/sub]
My opinion, for what it’s worth, is that while the surgeon did no physical harm to her he shouldn’t have done it.
He’s supposed to be a professional and adhere to a certain standard of conduct. What he did seems to show a lack of respect for his patient. It’s hard enough as it is in modern medical care for patients to retain any dignity at all, this didn’t help matters any.
What if a mortician decided to show his “school support” by branding a corpse? No one has been physically hurt so is this ok?
I don’t know if my analogy holds water or not, but that is my feeling on the matter. As to the legal end of things, I have no earthly idea.
Oh, and I forgot to add that, according to the newspaper, while she claims to have sent him a letter, he rebuts that he never saw it and that she missed several follow-up appointments with him after the surgery.
I guess I just don’t see what the harm here is. It brings to mind a friend of mine who griped because someone stole an old appliance that he had put out for trash pickup, before the garbage truck came to take it away.