A middle ago woman from South Western Sydney had resolved her claims against a major Western Sydney Hospital and a gynaecologist, following a disastrous outcome as a result of a contraindicated obstetric surgery for over $200,000.00.
In this case, it was recommended that our client undergo a series of obstetric operations including a hysteroscopy, non-invasive endometrial ablation, left salpingo-oophorectomy/ cystectomy and tubal ligation. This operation was recommended by her obstetrician/gynaecologist and performed at a major Western Sydney hospital.
In conjunction with this operation being recommended and provided, it should also be noted that the Plaintiff had several concurrent health issues at the time including high BMI, type 2 diabetes and hypercholesterolemia. Furthermore, she had a twenty eight year history of polycystic ovarian syndrome, previous colon abbesses and three children born by caesarean section. It appeared that this history was not properly taken into account in recommending the surgery mentioned above.
The surgery went ahead in late 2014 and can only be described as disaster. Aside from the surgery being abandoned during the procedure, it also caused ongoing significant pain and discomfort, psychiatric injuries, the formation of a hernia and additional scaring.
Following the surgery, this unfortunate woman was only aware of the disastrous outcome and the fact that the surgery had largely failed causing even more health issues. Being a lay-person, and unaware of the medical necessity of the operation but entirely aware of the unfortunate reality she now existed in, she approached Gerard Malouf and Partners. Our expert lawyer quickly identified that her complex medical history appeared to suggest that such a surgery should never have been performed in the first place.
In order to prove this, we obtained the abundance of this woman’s medical records and thoroughly investigated the full extent of her history. In doing so he reinforced his belief that the surgery appeared to have something that never should have been performed in the first place. In order to confirm this belief, we contacted a professor of obstetrics to provide an expert opinion as to his view of the case.
Upon receipt of this opinion it became abundantly clear that it was entirely inappropriate to provide these procedures. For example, the Plaintiff was a middle age woman who would likely go through menopause shortly. As a result, performing a hysteroscopy and endometrial ablation in the context of her medical history would appear to be unnecessary. Furthermore, prior to her surgery, it appears that the Plaintiff’s endometriosis was in fact not much of an issue. In addition, the performance of a cystectomy was also contraindicated given how the benign nature and smallness of the cysts. Other methods were available to the medical professionals involved in this case to identify any malignancy that would have necessitated an operation in a high risk patient. Furthermore, the tubal ligations sought, in the context of her medical history, created an extremely high risk procedure likely to cause more harm than good. The most concerning point of all this was that given the Plaintiff’s age and menopausal state, it was extremely unlikely she would conceive naturally anyway.
In obtaining this evidence, it became abundantly clear that this women had a very strong cause of action in the District Court of NSW and consequently an expert medical negligence barrister was briefed by our team to assist in this matter.
In this extremely complex and concerning case, we continued to gather evidence off this woman’s damage and of the contraindications of performing surgery in the first place. Despite the Defendant’s in this case gathering evidence raining other issues which appeared to be separate from the central issue in this case.
Fortunately for this woman, our team was able to arrange a mediation where the parties were able to eventually reach an agreement to resolve the claim for over $200,000.00.
We hope that this result provides some sense of solace to this woman who received an unnecessary operation from medical experts which ultimately lead to her outcome being significantly worse than it otherwise would have been. Whilst we recognise this ordeal would no doubt leave a scar on her life as she moves forward, we hope that the compensation nonetheless allows her to minimise the harm she now must suffer with.
For over the phone free advice or to take advantage of our face to face consultation call our expert medical negligence team today on our free line 1800 004 878.
