Verdicts & Settlements

Here is a sampling of malpractice cases and other serious injury cases that our lawyers have handled. Remember that each case is different. We’ve won more damages in cases than we expected, and we’ve lost cases we expected to win. Once a case is in the hands of the jury, it is out of our control. We do believe, however, that significant trial experience in big cases is one factor that may cause people to choose one attorney over another. Many of our clients have told us that this is true. With these disclaimers in mind, here are some of our cases:

Settlement For Anesthesia Error

A toddler child of our client went to a hospital for routine dental work. The child was anesthetized by a nurse anesthetist who was not supervised by an anesthesiologist. The nurse anesthetist overdosed the child with narcotics, and neither the nurse anesthetist nor the dentist kept an eye on the child following the surgery. The nurse who was assigned to the child following the surgery was not qualified to care for pediatric patients and put an adult oxygenation monitor on the child that did not fit. The child suffered severe, permanent brain damage as a result of the medical negligence.

Settlement For Failure To Timely Evaluate And Treat Infection Resulting In Severe Brain Damage

Clients of ours had a child who was born with a known bowel problem and a known high risk for bowel perforation. A doctor and the hospital failed to timely evaluate and treat signs of bowel perforation, which resulted in shock, brain damage and blindness.

Settlement For Birth Trauma

Our client gave birth in a hospital. The doctor delivering the baby did not know how to read and interpret the fetal monitor. Because the doctor did not know how to read and interpret the fetal monitor, the doctor did not recognize when the baby began to be deprived of oxygen during the birthing process. The child was born with a type of brain damage called Cerebral Palsy.

Settlement For Brain Injury From Bleeding

A client of ours who was 39 weeks pregnant called for an ambulance when she woke up bleeding. She was taken to a hospital where the doctors negligently failed to recognize that she needed a blood transfusion. Instead, she was allowed to bleed until she went into cardiac arrest and suffered permanent brain damage.

Settlement For Brain Injury From Jaundice

A client of ours gave birth to a daughter at a hospital. The pediatrician recognized that the baby was jaundiced at less than 30 hours of life, but did not order a simple blood test to check the baby’s level of bilirubin. The baby was discharged without being put under bilirubin lights. It turned out that the baby had a dangerously high level of bilirubin that resulted in kernicterus, a form of brain damage caused by excess bilirubin.

Settlement For Wrongful Death Of Post-Operative Patient

Our client’s parent was admitted to a hospital for a bowel surgery. Post-operatively her respiratory status progressively declined with no appropriate interventions by the nursing staff, which led to her death.

Bernalillo County Jury Awards $2,500,000 For Wrongful Death

The 82-year-old husband of our client fell down a flight of stairs at a local Zip Lube shop and died. The open and unguarded stairwell was located in an unlit hallway open to the public. The three Albuquerque police officers who investigated the death testified at trial that the hallway was dark and that the stairs were open and unguarded. The most the insurance company for Zip Lube offered prior to trial was $50,000.

$2,100,000 – Jury Verdict For A Cut Common Bile Duct

Our client had his gallbladder removed by a surgeon at the Presbyterian Hospital in Espanola, New Mexico. During the laparoscopic cholecystectomy (gallbladder removal), the surgeon negligently severed our client’s common bile duct and common hepatic artery. While his medical bills were only approximately $35,000 at the time of trial, we demonstrated to the jury that our client was likely to need a liver transplant sometime in the next twenty years due to the negligence. In post trial motions the Judge awarded almost $400,000 in post judgment interest because the hospital’s pre-trial offer was so far below the jury verdict.

$1,500,000 – Jury Verdict For Wrongful Death

The mother of our client went to her Lovelace family practice doctor complaining of chest discomfort and shortness of breath. The family practice doctor did not perform a cardiac workup, but instead told her she had chronic bronchitis. A few days after her last doctor’s appointment, she suffered a fatal heart attack and died at home. The most the insurance company for Lovelace Hospital offered prior to trial was $250,000.

$1,100,000 – Jury Verdict For Wrongful Death

The husband of our client was admitted to the Presbyterian Hospital in Clovis, New Mexico, for a suspected heart attack. The cardiologist negligently failed to administer a clot buster in a timely fashion. In addition, the nurses negligently failed to notify the doctor when his cardiac monitor showed that his condition was worsening. He was retired at the time of his death and the jury awarded $1,100,000 for the value of his life aside from his earning capacity.

$13,750,000 – Medical Negligence Wrongful Death

Settlement for the death of a young woman who bled to death after giving birth. Concerning signs and symptoms of bleeding were ignored by both doctors and nurses. One of the doctors, after being informed of critically low lab tests on the patient’s blood counts, left the hospital without seeing the patient to go to the gym to work out. We were able to show that the hospital negligently hired and negligently credentialed physicians that missed the fact that this young, otherwise healthy, woman lost so much blood that she ultimately went into cardiac arrest and died leaving her newborn baby without a mother. We uncovered that one of the physicians involved failed the board examinations multiple times, but the hospital hired the physician anyway. This physician also had multiple pending criminal charges for billing fraud, yet the hospital still retained the physician as an employee.

$16,000,000 – Catastrophic Birth Injury – Medication Error

Settlement for the catastrophic birth injury of a newborn baby whose mother was given an overdose because the nurse failed to follow medication safety procedures. We were able to show, by uncovering the medical record audit trail, that the nurse who negligently administered the overdose attempted to delete the evidence from the patient’s electronic medical record. As a result of the medication overdose, the baby suffered a catastrophic brain injury which resulted in the need for 24 hour a day care.

$7,500,000 – Catastrophic Brain Injury

Settlement for a catastrophic brain injury suffered by a young child because of the hospital’s failure to perform the required infectious disease prenatal testing on the child’s mother. As a result, the child will require 24 hour a day care for life.

$6,750,000 – Catastrophic Brain Injury – Failure to Protect Airway

Settlement for a catastrophic brain injury suffered by a young woman after experiencing problems with her airway after a surgery. Even though the doctors and nurses were aware that this patient was experiencing breathing difficulties, the doctor in charge of her care left the hospital and went to a personal appointment instead of staying with the patient and managing and protecting her airway. While this doctor was gone at a personal appointment, the patient stopped breathing and suffered catastrophic brain damage due to lack of oxygen. As a result, the patient was left in a vegetative state, unable to care for her two-year-old child.

$8,000,000 – Anesthesia Error

Settlement for a catastrophic brain injury suffered by a toddler during a dental procedure performed under anesthesia. Failure to monitor the toddler appropriately in the recovery room led to severe brain damage when the toddler stopped breathing due to excessive anesthesia and the failure to monitor appropriately.

$25,000,000 – Cancer Treatment Malpractice

Settlements for the failure to follow standard of care protocols for the treatment of childhood leukemia. This negligence resulted in the deaths of numerous children who otherwise would have survived had they been given the appropriate chemotherapy.

$5,500,000 – Negligent Failure to Timely Recognize Stroke

Settlement for brain damage for failure to evaluate and treat obvious signs and symptoms of an evolving stroke while the patient was in the patient was in the hospital for three days. By the time the hospital transferred the patient to a higher level of care, the patient had suffered permanent brain damage which could have been avoided with proper evaluation and treatment.

$6,000,000 – Negligent Failure to Treat Stroke

Settlement for permanent brain damage resulting from the failure to administer an adequate dose of clot buster in a patient with an evolving stroke.

$7,500,000 – Catastrophic Birth Injury

Settlement for birth injury resulting in permanent brain damage which occurred as a result of the nurses’ and the physician’s failure to adequately respond to very concerning signs on the fetal heart monitor tracing over many hours.

$12,500,000 – Catastrophic Birth Injury

Settlement for a birth injury resulting in permanent brain damage, caused by the failure of nurses and doctors to respond to multiple concerning findings on the fetal heart tracing over many hours.

$15,000,000 – Catastrophic Birth Injury

Settlement for a birth injury caused by the hospital’s failure to have an adequate on-call system, resulting in the OB nurses not being able to contact the on-call team when an emergency c-section was needed. We were able to prove the doctor involved lied in the medical records. This case was turned down by multiple other law firms due to concerns about the statute of limitations. We were successful in finding a legal theory to bring the case despite the statue of limitations and the fact that many years had passed since the time of the child’s birth.

$13,000,000 – Catastrophic Birth Injury

Settlement for a birth injury resulting in permanent brain damage due to the doctors and nurses failing to administer appropriate medications to the mother who was experiencing a prolonged seizure. This prolonged seizure deprived the baby of oxygen, resulting in brain damage which could have been prevented if appropriate medication had been given.

$7,900,000 – Catastrophic Birth Injury – Brachial Plexus Injury

Settlement for a brain injury caused by the midwives and nurses failing to properly respond to concerning signs on the fetal heart tracing over a period of hours. The healthcare providers also failed to do a proper risk assessment of the mother for a vaginal birth after previous c-section. The child suffered brain damage from lack of oxygen, and a brachial plexus injury (damaged nerves to the shoulder and arm).

$6,000,000 – Catastrophic Birth Injury

Settlement for brain injury caused by failure of the nurses and doctors to respond to concerning signs on the fetal heart tracing over a period of hours.