Chicago Medical Malpractice Lawyer Blog

At Hurley, McKenna, & Mertz, we have argued many cases of institutional negligence. Institutional negligence occurs when a hospital, nursing home, “surgicenter” or other health care facility violates its independent duty to act reasonably in providing care to patients, and in supervising the provision of that care in the facility, resulting in injury to a patient. Over forty years ago the Illinois Supreme Court recognized that a hospital has a duty to use reasonable care in the administration and management of the institution. Courts in other states have followed suit and held hospitals around the United States to the same standard. As medical malpractice lawyers, we find the following case unacceptable.

The New York Times (6/21, A1, Bogdanich) reports on the Philadelphia VA hospital, where "a rogue cancer unit...that operated with virtually no outside scrutiny...botched 92 of 116 cancer treatments over a span of more than six years -- and then kept quiet about it."

Dr. Gary D. Kao was responsible for all but a handful of the treatment mistakes. In treating Prostate cancer, small radioactive stones can be inserted into the body and placed near the prostate. In several instances, Dr. Kao was severely inaccurate with his placement of the stones. In one case, most of the 40 stones inserted ended up in the patient’s gall bladder. Dr. Kao then rewrote his surgical plan to cover up his mistake with permission from the institutional regulators. The patients were not informed of the mistakes in their treatment for several years until federal investigators uncovered the mistakes.

Negligence occurred not only on the part of the physician, but also on the part of the institution for knowingly allowing surgical revisions. Furthermore, “peer review, a staple of every good hospital, in which colleague’s examine one another’s work, did not exist in the unit.” Overall, the implant program lacked a “safety culture,” and the nuclear commission found that Dr. Kao and other members of his team were not properly supervised or trained.