Philadelphia injury attorney Leonard Hill, founder of Hill & Associates, P.C., represented the estate of Ellen Breen, who died following a minimally invasive surgery that went wrong.
PHILADELPHIA, May 12, 2024 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Philadelphia injury attorney Leonard Hill, founder of Hill & Associates, P.C., represented the estate of Ellen Breen, who died following a minimally invasive surgery that went wrong. Hill's colleague Susan Ayres also assisted in representing the plaintiffs.
The jury awarded a $10 million verdict in favor of the plaintiff on February 13th. The jury found that Ellen Breen's death following an operation at Albert Einstein Medical Center occurred as a result of the surgeon's negligence. The plaintiffs claimed the surgeon who operated on Breen failed to consider risk factors that complicated the procedure—a laparoscopic removal of Breen's ovaries and fallopian tubes.
The plaintiffs contended that the surgeon did not properly familiarize herself with Breen's medical history, and used medical techniques that did not consider complicating factors like the decedent's obesity. The plaintiff's pretrial memo stated that the operation was meant to be a "minimally invasive outpatient surgery". During the operation, one of Breen's arteries was severed, and she died three days later after undergoing several invasive corrective surgeries, the plaintiffs said.
Leonard Hill stated that "the lesson we learned from this trial was that when doctors don't take responsibility for their actions, jurors make them pay. Hill said that the defense particularly focused on Breen's obesity at trial, which he contended backfired. He said the plaintiffs pointed out that, given the prevalence of obesity in America, doctors should be prepared to operate on obese patients. "Just because a patient is obese doesn't mean that they should get a lower standard of care," he said.
Hill said that "when we try cases, we try to emphasize to jurors why it's important for them to hold doctors accountable because the next case could be you." Leonard Hill said the verdict reflects jurors' protectiveness toward members of the public.
Defense lawyers for Albert Einstein Medical Center argued that it provided appropriate care and noted that Breen had a history of health issues and prior surgeries. Obermayer Rebmann Maxwell & Hippel partner Gary Samms, who represented Einstein, said he thinks the verdict was wrong. He said the jury was "problematic" and "ignored the evidence", improperly basing its decision on emotion rather than the facts of the case.
"Sometimes, no matter how good the medicine is, if the jury's not open to hearing the evidence, you can't do much about it. We have to do a better job making sure the jury understands the medicine," Samms said.
The case, captioned Scott v. Einstein Medical Center, was tried before Judge Craig Levin of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas.
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SOURCE Hill & Associates, P.C.
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