Doctors not able to perform emergency life-saving surgery

Partners Larry Morris and Randy Haynes have each recently successfully handled wrongful death medical malpractice cases where one key element of the malpractice was the treating doctors inability to perform life-saving procedures when they were needed. In Randy Haynes’ case, the doctor of a patient whose throat was swelling shut was not authorized to perform an emergency tracheostomy which would have saved the patient’s life. In Larry Morris’ case, a patient undergoing a routine laryngotomy had a breathing tube inserted in her, but the doctor failed to pull out a plastic piece, the stylet, that allowed the patient to breathe out as well as in. As a result of this failure, the patient’s lungs basically exploded with air. The patient still could have been saved had the doctor been able to perform a needle thoracotomy, but the doctor was not qualified to do so, and he waited 15 minutes before getting another doctor who was qualified in the procedure to perform it. Consequently, the patient died. Both cases either settled or tried to a verdict for a significant amount of money.

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