Being a doctor can be a difficult profession. A lot of lives depend on you and your expertise, especially if you are a surgeon. The thing is, no matter how good some doctors are, they sometimes make mistakes, costly ones too. One doctor even made the mistake of removing a healthy kidney from a patient because he thought it was a
Back in April 2016, Ramon Vazquez, a surgeon for the Wellington Regional Medical Center in Florida had a patient named Maureen Pacheco. Vazquez had the task of cutting open Pacheco in a surgery for a back operation. However, during the procedure, Vazquez noticed what he believed was an abnormality in the pelvic area of the patient.
According to Vazquez, it was a “gynecological malignancy, lymphoma and/or other metastatic disease.” Hence, without informing the patient or waiting for another doctor’s opinion, he cut and removed it off. Turns out, it was a healthy kidney which did not ascend to the patient’s abdomen, something that Vazquez would have known had he reviewed the patient’s medical records.
Of course, the woman was distraught after losing a healthy kidney which could make her more susceptible to kidney failure. So, she sued all doctors involved and received $500,000 as settlement. As for Vazquez’s extended penalty, he was to be fined $3,000 and give an hour-long lecture on long-site surgery to the hospital staff, a decision which was made only late last year.
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