A 3.4 Million Settlement Has Been Reached With Ohio State University For A Medical Negligence Lawsuit They Were Facing After A Man Died Of An Undiagnosed Condition
Ohio State University has agreed to pay two separate $1.7 million paymentstotaling $3.4 million for both settlements) settling a wrongful death medical negligence lawsuits filed against the university. By offering the settlement, the university claims that it did no wrong, but chose to file outside of court to avoid the high cost of a legal battle.
According to the medical negligence lawsuit, filed in the Ohio Court of Claims, Ohio State University was accused of causing the death of a man who visited the Ohio State’s Stoneridge Medical Center in Dublin complaining of severe rectal pain. The man died in 2009 after he was advised to continue taking pain medication. However, the man died of a bleeding in the brain as a result of an undiagnosed condition that caused severe internal bleeding. According to the lawsuit, the man continued to call the medical center over a period of several days before his death complaining of severe pain and bleeding but was told to just continue taking medication. Ohio State has agreed to pay $1.4 million to the man’s family and pay a $300,000 annuity to the man’s children over a period of four years. [dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2015/11/02/wexner-medical-malpractice-payments.html, November 2015]
In a separate case, Ohio State University has agreed to pay $1.75 million to another man who claims that the university’s medical care left him with permanent injuries. According to the lawsuit, the man was undergoing treatment for spinal surgery in 2013 when air was allowed into catheter tubing, which caused air to enter his circulatory system and gave him an embolism. The man has suffered brain strokes, spine strokes, vision problems, permanent numbness, and heart attacks as a result of the embolism. Just as in the previous case, OSU has agreed to settle without acknowledging any incident of wrongdoing or negligence.
Ohio State University is no stranger to lawsuits, but it does not often see accusations of medical lawsuits. Previous lawsuits faced by the university have involved staff members, sports players, and police brutality. Across the state, Ohio is seeing fewer medical negligence cases, according to a report published in the Columbus Dispatch. In 2012, the last year of data available, Ohio medical companies paid just f $177.3 million to 576 claimants, with an average settlement amount of just over $300,000 per person. It is rare for an Ohio settlement to reach in the millions like the two cases settled by Ohio State University. Failure to treat and delayed or improper treatment received the biggest payouts and were more likely to be settled than cases filed for other reasons, which often were dismissed entirely. According to the report by the Columbus Dispatch, settlements were more likely to be awarded to residents living in northeastern Ohio, but residents of this area were also more likely to file a negligence or malpractice claim. Payments and claims have been on the decline since 2003’s Senate Bill 281, which capped “pain and suffering” awards, at $500,000 per occurrence. [dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2014/05/02/report-medical-malpractice-claims-hit-low.html, November 2015]
