Aneurysm case- Mediated Settlement
A 57 year old person presented at local hospital with complaints of headaches and nausea. She was admitted and an MRI was scanned of her head which was equivocal. After two more days of treatment and the symptoms had not abated, principally, a third nerve palsy with ptosis and the left eye almost completely shut, the attending neurologist ordered an MRA to rule out an aneurysm. Despite the clinical signs and symptoms of an aneurysm, after the MRA was read as negative and the patient discharged (unbelievably), on January 1, five days later, the patient hemorrhaged and she was air lifted to a major hospital where she underwent surgery and clipping of a posterior communicating aneurysm.
Client is now disabled 24-7 and can partially live independently for a few hours at a time but she needs assisted living, planning, prompting and care for the rest of her life.
As in most aneurysm cases, a life care plan and evaluation of the patient’s home and support was necessary, particularly since she was not married and had no responsible family members to care for her.
Rob Kornfeld hired a life care planner to evaluate the cost of her future life care plan for the rest of her life and an economist to evaluate her wage loss and future economic expenses of her life care plan, medical and support.
The patient had incurred over $800,000 in medical expenses. The insurer of the patient paid out about $462,000 and was asserting a subrogation and reimbursement claim for those monies. The client’s wage loss and future care totaled about $700,000.
The difficulty with the case was that the client looked normal. She walked, talked and appeared just fine. After you spent about 5-10 minutes with her simple things she was unable to do, such as, remembering her own phone number and that of others to enter into a cell phone even if you provided her with the number. She could not figure out how to dial a number unless it was programmed into her phone. Further, she would not admit anything was wrong with her and denied she was disabled or injured. Nonetheless, her doctors refused to allow her to drive because she was cognitively impaired and suffered from a visual field deficit in one quadrant. This arguably was caused by the pressure on the third nerve and not by the bleeding and stroke she suffered causing cognitive impairment.
The case settled at mediation for $1,900,000 new money and a waiver of the $462,000 medical lien plus payment of all SGAL and special needs trust fees, costs and expenses. It is anticipated that with a special needs trust and a structured settlement through an annuity held through this special needs trust plus additional cash, the client will be able to continue to receive her DSHA benefits from Washington since there will be no constructive receipt of the settlement funds. This approach to handling settlements of catastrophically injured patients is a vehicle which is to be considered by all who are seriously injured in a medical negligence case by the fault of a health care provider.
Rob Kornfeld
Rob@Kornfeldlaw.com
(425) 893-8989 or see www.Kornfeldlaw.com or http://www.brainaneurysmlawyer.com/
