An ulcer ignored

Lawsuit: Untreated bedsore 

caused man permanent injury

By David Baker
Posted Monday March 31, 2014
428 words

St. Peter’s Hospital, Sunnyview Rehabilitation Center and two doctors are named as defendants in a lawsuit in which it is alleged that a 52-year-old man developed a life-threatening condition and was left with a permanent injury after a bedsore was not treated.

According to legal papers, after John Carp underwent bypass surgery at St. Peter’s Hospital in Albany in May 2012 he developed an ulcer.  He was discharged but a week later was readmitted with a fever and was found to have a stage 4 decubitus ulcer and severe sepsis – a potentially life-threatening condition.  Surgery to remove a softball size area of dead tissue was performed, during which Carp lost a large amount of blood.

He was then  transferred to Sunnyview Rehabilitation Center in Niskayuna and placed on a wound pump for a month.  He was discharged and remained on it at home for another two months.

Carp’s attending physician at St. Peter’s Hospital, Niloo Edwards, allegedly failed to recognize that Carp was at high risk of developing an ulcer or that an ulcer had appeared before Carp was discharged.

Another doctor, Eugene Goykhman, was Carp’s attending physician at Sunnyview Rehabilitation center.

“…(D)espite having knowledge and/or being on notice of the fact that Plaintiff was admitted to Sunnyview with a secral ulcer, Dr. Goykhman was negligent and/or deviated from accepted standards of medical care when he failed to adequately treat Plaintiff’s ulcer to prevent it  from progressing,” a document in the lawsuit says.  As a result of this, Carp “… has sustained serious and permanent injuries including severe pain and suffering.”

The claim against Sunnyview includes a demand for punitive damages for its alleged failure to comply with a section of New York public health law regarding the prevention and treatment of bedsores.

The lawsuit was filed in June 2013.
 
In 2007, Sunnyview became a part of Northeast Health Inc., which operated Samaritan Hospital in Troy and Memorial Hospital in Albany.  In 2013 Northeast Health joined St. Peter’s Hospital and Seton Health/ St. Mary’s Hospital in Troy under a single governing board named St. Peter’s Health Partners.  The new entity also gained control of a network of nursing homes, rehab centers and clinics across the Capital Region.

Carp’s attorneys are the law firm D’Orazio, Peterson LLP of Saratoga Springs. (Peterson is a Scott M. Peterson, who appears to be the same attorney who previously worked at the Albany law firm Napieski, VanDenbugh & Napieski, a firm that defends medical providers in malpractice cases.  Peterson is no longer listed on that firm’s web page.)

The defendants are represented by Burke, Scolamiero, Mortati & Hurd of Albany; Maguire, Cardona of Menands; and Thorn Gerson & Bonanni of Albany.

***

Coming next: Former gynecologist and now prison inmate Akiva Abraham, Samaritan Hospital - and the $1.6 million confidential settlement for the death of a woman during childbirth.

********