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Negligence claim against Indian doctor settled for $150,000

The husband of an 88-year-old woman who died after Dr Tummala Prasad left 20 inches of gauze packing in her body has won a $150,000 settlement from Columbia Lawnwood Regional Medical Centre.

The husband had sought twice the amount. Calling the award a compromise, Circuit Judge E Randolph Bentley said Edward Scheel cannot file any more lawsuits against the hospital for his wife's death, according to a September 9 order made public on Tuesday afternoon.

Dr Prasad had earlier testified that the failure to remove the gauze packing did not significantly contribute to Carmela Scheel's health problems. He said Scheel had several other problems, including hypertension, heart failure, frequent urinary infections, abdominal distension, and bleeding caused by haematoma.

But Edward Scheel testified that the wad of gauze prevented successful treatment of the other conditions.

In the wrongful-death lawsuit filed in 1997, Scheel said his wife died in 1995 after Dr Prasad left the wad of gauze packing in her hip prosthesis. The suit said the gauze caused an infection that killed the woman about three months after the surgery.

Carmela Scheel was admitted to Lawnwood for heart-related problems on April 5, 1995. The same day, Dr Prasad ordered that her wound from a hip replacement be packed with gauze twice a day.

A month after Scheel left Lawnwood, she checked into Columbia Medical Centre, Port St Lucie, where doctors found the gauze in the wound, legal papers said.

The gauze caused an infection in Scheel's hip that led to organ failure and ultimately her death, on July 25, 1995, according to the lawsuit.

Judge Bentley said Lawnwood did not admit any wrongdoing by accepting the settlement. "Lawnwood.... denies negligence and denies that the retention of gauze contributed to (Carmela Scheel's) medical course and ultimate death, and the settlement amount represents a compromise of a hotly disputed claim," he wrote in his order.

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