Daniel K. Cray Obtains Defense Verdict in Medical Negligence Trial

Third year Board of Directors Member, Daniel K. Cray, and Jennifer M. Hart, obtained a defense verdict following a two and a half week wrongful death, medical malpractice trial in Joliet, Will County, Illinois.

Plaintiff's decedent, her 26 year old mother, had aortic bi-femoral bypass surgery followed by a bloody bowel movement one day post-op. The general surgery defendants called in on consult did not think there was on-going bowel ischemisa or that intervention was needed. Plaintiff's mother was discharged, but readmitted two days later. The plaintiff's mother died 22 days after her readmission following work-up by the general surgeons and other physicians for various diagnoses. An exploratory laparotomy surgery performed one day before the mother's death found 25 feet of her small bowel and her ascending colon were necrotic.

The defense presented testimony from a variety of medical sub-specialties that the patient's complaints were consistent with a dozen abdominal conditions and diseases. The defense further contended that the work-up was reasonable given the patient's signs and symptoms and that the patient's clinical course was inconsistent with acute or chronic mesenteric ischemia. Finally, it was the defendants' position that the exact cause of lack of blood flow to the mother's small and large intestines was never proven to be related to chronic mesenteric disease as a post-mortem autopsy was never performed.