Callahan & Blaine

A settlement was recently reached in a case in which a Florida woman went in for back surgery and came out with one less kidney.

Maureen Pacheco, 51, of West Palm Beach had suffered a back injury in a car accident which required surgery. One of her surgeons, Dr. Ramon Vazquez, was tasked with opening Pacheco up and setting up access to the surgical site for the other doctors to come in and operate on Pacheco’s spine. Unfortunately, Vazquez found a pelvic mass and assumed that the mass was some kind of metastatic disease and removed it.

A few days later the pathologist realized that the mass that was removed was not cancer at all, but Pacheco’s left kidney.

The kidney had been in an unusual location because it’s what is called a “pelvic kidney.” These can occur in some people when one of their kidneys fails to ascend properly during in utero organ development.

MRIs done prior to the surgery showed that the kidney was healthy and functioning as it should.

The lawsuit stated that two other doctors involved in the surgery were also complicit, Dr. John Britt and Dr. Jeffrey Kugler. Kugler and Britt were negligent because they failed to exhaust all “conservative pain management options” before recommending surgery, and that they should have confirmed that Vazquez consulted with Pacheco and looked at the MRIs before opening her up. They were also liable for failing to ensure that Vazquez knew Pacheco had a pelvic kidney prior to surgery.

So what did the court determine the value of Pacheco’s kidney to be? $750,000, or $250,000 per doctor involved to be paid by their medical malpractice insurance.

If you or someone you know has suffered a catastrophic injury or died as the result of medical malpractice, please contact our California law firm for expert legal counsel.