TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — One of Tucson’s largest hospitals is facing a large penalty for a medical mistake. There is a multi million dollar judgment against Banner University Medical Center.
At Banner University Medical Center, a lot of surgeries may go just fine but a jury agreed one woman’s surgery did not. And that’s why she’s in line to collect four million dollars.
“It’s terrifying, you know, to hear someone say you have foreign objects in your body. It's really terrifying,” says Amanda Hoover.
Hoover went to Banner University Medical Center to have a baby. Her doctors decided to do a C-Section.
“I had a little bit of pain afterward and I went to a couple of follow ups. And they had told me that the pain I was feeling was normal to the C section and organs being moved around. So I took their advice and tried to live my life.”
But she says after 14 months of pain, the pain was so bad she went to a different hospital’s emergency department.
A CT scan showed doctors left a sponge inside her body during the C-Section. It had worked its way through the wall of her colon.
Banner offered $250,000 to settle. She asked the Mercaldo Law Firm to let her take her chances with a jury instead.
“Because I just felt like holding somebody accountable for doing something wrong should be a standard. Nobody should be able to just say, ‘Hey, I'm gonna do this, but I know it's not helping you in the long run.’”
A jury decided she should receive four million dollars—-sixteen times Banner’s settlement offer.
“It was relieving because I knew that I would be taken care of and, you know, I am going to have health problems for the rest of my life. And so I need that settlement to, you know, get me to where I'm gonna need to be in the future in a healthy life.”
Amanda Hoover says she hopes women will question doctors thoroughly before they have surgery and be persistent if something seems to be wrong.
We asked Banner for the hospital’s side of this story but the company says it does not comment on legal matters. There’s still the potential of lengthy appeals to decide if the case is truly over and if the full jury judgment will be paid.
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Craig Smith is a reporter for KGUN 9. With more than 40 years of reporting in cities like Tampa, Houston and Austin, Craig has covered more than 40 Space Shuttle launches and covered historic hurricanes like Katrina, Ivan, Andrew and Hugo. Share your story ideas and important issues with Craig by emailing craig.smith@kgun9.com or by connecting on Facebook and Twitter.
