A 35-year-old wife and mother of two died from adult respiratory distress syndrome after doctors failed to provide proper medical treatment. The deceased's husband, individually and as administrator of the deceased's estate, sued Defendant--medical hospital and relevant medical personnel involved in his late wife's care and treatment leading up to her death. Prior to trial, the hospital settled and Plaintiff discontinued the claims against many of the doctors employed by the hospital. Plaintiff presented evidence that the deceased suffered from temporal arteritis, a condition that rapidly depleted her immune system. Although the deceased was placed on steroidal treatment, Plaintiff asserted that the deceased's doctors failed to ensure that the deceased receive consistent doses of the steroid treatment, and that proper steroidal treatment would have boosted the deceased's immunity sufficiently to save her life. The jury found that the doctors responsible for the care failed to dose the deceased consistently, and that in addition to other deviations from accepted standards of medical care, the deviations in this case caused the death.
Verdict: $5,720,000
Harold Smith v. The Long Island College Hospital, et al.
