Articles Posted in Verdicts & Settlements

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On February 6, 2013, the Chicago law firm of Goldberg & Goldberg, LLC filed a wrongful death case on behalf of the Estate of Genevieve Klimczak who died on February 12, 2012. Ms. Klimczak was a resident of McHenry Villa, a self described “retirement community” offering 24 hour a day security…”so residents can leave the worries of living alone behind them.” McHenry Villa and Home Instead, Inc. have been named as defendants in the lawsuit. McHenry Villa is located at 3516 W. Waukegan Road in McHenry, Illinois.

On February 12, 2012, Genevieve Klimczak a 91 year old resident of McHenry Villa with Alzheimer’s disease was allowed to elope from her room at McHenry Villa and walk out of the building through a self-locking door that could not be opened from the outside. Ms. Klimczak’s body was found the next morning by employees of McHenry Villa. The temperature overnight was as low as 7 degrees Fahrenheit. At the time, Ms Klimczak was being attended by caregivers from Home Instead, Inc. Ms. Klimczak is survived by her nephews, Donald Lorenz and John Lorenz, and her niece, Evelyn Marthalar.. Mrs. Klimczak was a lifelong resident of Chicago.

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Abbott Laboratories best selling drug, Humira, has been linked to a host of serious side effects, including severe neurological injuries. Abbott’s is on track to sell $15 billion worth of the drug per year by 2015. Abbott already expects to sell close to $10 billion worth of Humira in 2012. Humira is used to treat a variety of rheumatological conditions, including, Rheumatoid Arthritis and Ankylosing Spondylitis as well as Crohn’s disease.

In 2009, Abbott included the following warning in the package insert for Humira under section 5.5 titled, Neurologic Reactions:

“Use of TNF blocking agents, including HUMIRA, has been associated with rare cases of new onset or exacerbation of clinical symptoms and/or radiographic evidence of demyelinating disease. Prescribers should exercise caution in considering the use of HUMIRA in patients with preexisting or recent-onset central nervous system demyelinating disorders.”

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Goldberg & Goldberg, LLC is pleased to announce that they have settled a wrongful death case involving the death of a newborn child for $1,625,000.00. The case, Vega v. St. James Hospital, et al, involved the negligent diagnosis and management of fetal distress of mother and child during labor and delivery at St. James Hospital in Chicago Heights, Illinois in 2002. The baby survived a little over one hour before he ultimately died due to complications surrounding his resuccitation.

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.

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Goldberg & Goldberg, LLC partner, Ian R. Alexander, secured a $1,000,000.00 settlement in the case of Newburg v. Swedish American Hospital, et al 02 L 263 which is pending in Winnebago County, Rockford, Illinois. In 2001, the day before Thanksgiving, Margaret Hoffman went to Swedish American Hospital complaining of chest and back pain. Doctors in the Emergency Room were able to determine that she was not having a heart attack. Her cardiologist ordered the hospital to perform a CT Scan of Ms. Hoffman’s chest in order to rule out an aortic aneurysm as the cause of her pain. The hospital did not carry out the order for a CT scan until 48 hours later when Ms. Hoffman experienced a drop in her hemoglobin which indicated that the aneurysm had ruptured. Unfortuntely this intervention came to late and Ms. Hoffman, a 61 year old clerk at Zion Development Corporation, passed away on the operating table.

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.

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Fact: Did you know independent authoritative studies have shown that medical malpractice claims have little effect on overall health care costs?

• 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.

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Lawyers at Goldberg & Goldberg, LLC secured a $5 million dollar settlement on behalf of a 22 year old man who was brain injured at birth when his labor and delivery at Northwestern Memorial Hospital was negligently managed by resident physicians. The labor and delivery was managed by residents because the plaintiff was a low income patient and in 1988 Northwestern Memorial Hospital had a policy of allowing residents manage the delivery of patients who did not have private physicians.

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, LLC 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.

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The Illinois Supreme Court in a 4-2 decision struck down limits on damages awards in medical malpractice cases with its decision in Lebron v. Gottlieb Memorial Hospital on thursday. The court held that the legislation was unconstitutional. The majority opinion, authored by Justice Fitzgeral held, in part: “[W]e necessarily consider…the legislature’s goal in enacting the statue-responding to a health-care crisis. Our separation of powers analysis, however, does not stop there. The crux of our analysis is whether the statue unduly infringes upon the inherent power of the judiciary. Here, the legislature’s attempt to limit…damages in medical malpractice actions runs afoul of the separation of powers clause.”

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.

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Radiation therapy in cancer treatment uses high doses of radiation to kill cancer cells and helps prevwent them from spreading throughout the body. The use of radiation therapy is one of the primary means that physicians have to help treat patients who have been diagnosed with cancer and is prescribed in 60% of all cancer treatment scenarios. Radiation is typically prescribed and administered through the use of an external beam which is provided by a machine called a linear accelerator. The beam is localized and given in precise measures of energy, or doses, to specific areas on the human body for treatment.

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, LLC 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.

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The Chicago Sun-Times reported today about Goldberg & Goldberg, LLC’s record recovery in a wrongful death case where the deceased had only adult children survivng her. Patricia Quirk, age 60, died in 2004 after her doctors at Little Company Of Mary Hospital negligently over radiated her while treating her for cancer.

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.

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Barry D. Goldberg and Peter A. Nicholson of the Chicago law firm of Goldberg & Goldberg, LLC have settled a wrongful death case on behalf of the Estate of Patricia Quirk for $7.5 million. Quirk v. Little Company of Mary, et al., 05 L 00379. The case was assigned for trial to the Hon. Thomas Hogan in the Circuit Court of Cook County. Little Company of Mary is represented by Marilee Clausing and Susan Hannigan of Anderson, Rasor & Partners, Radiation Oncology, S.C. is represented by David Burkter of Cunningham, Meyer & Vedrine and the radiation oncologist is represented by Mary Cunningham of Kominiarek, Bresler, Harvick and Gundmundson, all of Chicago.

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, LLC 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, LLC 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.”

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