While the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) have prohibited hospitals from recovering payment for the treatment of secondary conditions acquired in the hospital, practically, these charges are often submitted and paid by Medicare long before and attorney becomes involved and makes a claim for medical malpractice. Careful examination of the supporting documentation Medicare provides at the time they require reimbursement often reveals that benefits were paid for hospital acquired events.

We pay close attention to each and every aspect of our clients cases and work very hard to insure that they receive the maximum recovery. This includes the work we do to check and negotiate all of our clients liens, including Medicare liens.

The defendants claimed that the child suffered from a microscopic pathologic defect which prevented him from being able to adequately perfuse oxygen in utero. The child is survived by his parents and three brothers and sisters.

Ms. Hofman was survived by her two adult children. Records indicate that this settlement was one of the largest recoveries in recent history in Winnebago County for a wrongful death case where the survivors were adult children, and one of the few cases to settle in Rockford for in excess of $1,000,000.

We are very proud of the hard work that we did for Ms. Hoffman's family. From the beginning all of the defendants claimed that Ms. Hoffman's death was a result of her own poor health and had nothing to do with the numerous mistakes that they made in caring for her while she was a patient at the hospital over the Thanksgiving holiday in 2001.

Officials for the Canadian National Railway have now admitted that the grade crossing protection system was deactivated amd did not function as it whould have. CN crews working nearby had inadvertently deactivated the gates, bells and warning lights at the crossing prior to the accident.

Sadly, when Lunn crossed the tracks just east of Governors Highway at 9:40 p.m. her sport utility vehicle was struck by an oncoming train killing her instantly. There is no question that this accident and the tragic death of this young woman could have been avoided.

• Malpractice claims boost overall health care costs no more than a tiny percentage
according to the Congressional Budget Office.

• The Congressional Budget Office has also concluded that the most anti-patient medical
malpractice "reforms" may lead to poorer health care and worse patient outcomes.
Source: Personal Health Care Expenditures taken from the Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services.

• For more information regarding insurance reform, see "The Whole Truth About Medical Malpractice and nsurance" pages 31-33 available HERE.

*Thanks to the Illinois Trial Lawyer's Association for this information.

The plaintiff was able to file his lawsuit against Northwestern thanks to a law in Illinois that preserves the rights of brain injured people against the statutes of limitations and repose which would have ordinarily run. Goldberg & Goldberg challenged the statute of limitations law in a prior lawsuit and helped create this protection for brain injured children in a prior piece of litigation.

The settlement money in this case will be used to buy our brain injured client a handicap accesible home, electric wheelchair and a special van with a lift, among other things. He and his mother have had to do without this assistance for the past 22 years.

A tipster who had heard the news coverage of the crash apparently notified police about Castillo's possible involvement in the case. A search warrant was issued and police discovered a silver vehicle which is linked by physical evidence to Gilliam's death.

Anyone with information about Castillo's wherabouts is asked to call the Chicago Police Department's Major Accident Investigation Unit, 312-745-4521. We hope that the hard work of the police and the Gilliam family pays off and Castillo is brought back to Chicago to face charges.

This is a major victory for patients and consumers in Illinois. The legislature has tried, on three seperate occasions, to enact caps on damages in medical malpractice cases. For years lobbiests for the insurance industry have argued that medical malpractice awards have contributed to the high cost of health care in Illinois despite the fact that insurace payouts on these claims have remained level for the past two decades.

All citizens of Illinois should have a right to ask a jury of their peers for redress when they have been victimized by negligence, regardless of the profession of the guilty party. To see a copy of the Supreme Courts landmark opinion look here.

Over radiation occurs when some element of error occurs during the treatment process and the patient gets more then the prescribed dose of radiation over a period of time. While the linear accelerator is a very precise provider of radiation, there is a human component involved in doing the math and physics required to set up the machine to provide accurate treatment dosage. The system sometimes fails when these human failsafes are ignored and the patient receives the wrong amount of radiation.

The results for over radiated patients are devastating. The extra radiation, even in seemingly small doses, weakens and kills healthy tissue causing skin and organ damage, and often death. At Goldberg & Goldberg we have handled over radiation cases which have resulted in record recoveries for our clients including a verdict of $16 million and a settlement of $7.5 million.

The lawsuit accused The Hospital and Quirk's radiation oncologist of failing to make sure that Ms. Quirk received the proper amount of radiation while receiving treatment for stage 3 endometrial cancer. She ultimately received overradiation on seventeen different occasions of her treatment. Ironically, at the time of her death she was cancer free,

The lawsuit settled for $7.5 million. Mrs. Quirk is survived by her husband and two sons.

Beginning on March 26, 2003, Patricia Quirk received an overdose of radiation to her pelvis as she underwent radiation therapy for a stage 3 endometrial cancer. She received 50% more than the prescribed dose of radiation on 17 separate occasions during her radiation therapy. This radiation overdose ultimately perforated her bowel, causing her to become septic and leading to her death on May 8, 2004 at the age of 60. Mrs. Quirk is survived by her husband Thomas Quirk and two adult children. Mrs. Quirk was a life long resident of Chicago who resided in the West Lawn neighborhood. She was a social worker who was considered an expert in the field of community relations and the concurrent politics of mental health care. She was previously honored by four Chicago Mayors, the City Council and the Illinois General Assembly for her work with the mentally disabled citizens of Illinois.

Goldberg & Goldberg is a premier Chicago, Illinois law firm that concentrates its practice in the representation of plaintiffs in medical malpractice lawsuits. In addition to this settlement Goldberg & Goldberg has secured other significant results in over radiation cases, including a $16 million jury verdict in 2005. Barry D. Goldberg, one of the firms senior partners, also has the largest personal injury verdict in the history of the state, a record setting $127 million result. Goldberg said, "we are pleased to be able to deliver some measure of justice to the Quirks who have suffered such a terrible loss of this wonderful person."

This settlement is a record settlement in Cook County for the wrongful death of an adult leaving no minor children as survivors, the previous record was $7.3 million, and is a record settlement for an over-radiation wrongful death case in Cook County.

Cardamone was sentenced to twenty years in prison by a DuPage County jury in 2005 for fondling seven former students. His conviction was eventually overturned by an appeals court that ordered him to undergo a new trial.

The civil lawsuits was settled by the insurance company that insured the family gym, The American Institute Of Gymnastics, in Aurora, which is owned by Cardamone's mother, Linda Lynch. Lynch, in a statement said, that she still supports her son and that any settlement over "zero is too much," The thirteen girls will split up the proceeds of the settlement.

Unfortunately, it appears that the court did not release the decision today as anticipated. This is not an uncommon occurence. The Lebron case was argued before the court over one year ago and the supreme's decision is much anticipated by the trial bar and general public.

The Medical Malpractice Reform Act of 2005 was determined to be unconstitutional by Judge Diane Larsen of the Circuit Court of Cook County. Her ruling determined that caps on damages in medical malpractice cases are not allowed by the state constitution, something that the Illinois Supreme Court has decided on two prior occasions.

To date almost 450 Paxil related suicide lawsuits have been settled by the drug manufacturer. There are an additional 600 claims outstanding claiming that Paxil caused birth defects. In October, a Philadelphia jury found the drug maker responsible for birth defects in a 3 year old boy and ordered a $2.5 million dollar award to the boy and his family.

At Goldberg & Goldberg we routinely handle drug product liability cases and have the largest drug product liability verdict in Illinois history, and award of more then $127,000,000. Please feel free to contact us for a free consultation.

Woods said the impetus for the settlement came with a phone call from hospital president Sandra Coletta. In that call, he said he heard something he'd never heard from Kent Hospital before, someone saying she was sorry for his family's loss.

It has been widely reported that apologizing for medical mistakes is the number one way a doctor or hospital can help curtail a medical malpractice claim. Often times patients and their families are looking for closure after the loss of a loved one. An apology is often the piece of the grief puzzle that helps wounds heal and allows people to move on after a tragedy.

For his part, Woods said the conclusion would give him, if not closure, some piece of mind about the meaning of his brother's death. "It makes it possible for me to go to my brother's grave and ask if I've done the right thing," he said.