Medical Malpractice Series: What Happens When Surgical Tools Are Left Behind? (Judy Susskind)

Judy Susskind, an experienced medical malpractice lawyer at Sommers Schwartz Law Firm, discusses a critical issue in healthcare: surgical tools and sponges left inside patients after surgery. Every surgery carries risks, but when surgical tools or materials are forgotten inside a patient, serious injuries, infections, and even life-threatening conditions can occur.

Transcript

My name is Judy Susskind, and I’m a medical malpractice lawyer with the Sommers Schwartz Law Firm. Is there really any such thing as a simple surgery? Well, every surgery carries risk. Every surgery has the potential of causing harm. Surgeries require due care to prevent that harm.

In an invasive surgery, there are surgical tools that are put inside of you. There might be surgical gauze, there might be surgical sponges. Those items, most of the time are not meant to be left inside of you at the end of the case. When surgical tools are left behind, surgical sponges are left behind, this can cause severe injury. It is not supposed to happen.

A foreign body left inside can raise havoc. It can cause damage to organs. It can cause infection, and if the infection gets into the bloodstream, it can cause sepsis.

Sepsis can cause organ damage and death.

No matter how lengthy, how involved, how complicated a surgery is, it is never acceptable to leave a foreign body inside of a patient that was supposed to come out at the end of the surgery. We have handled, successfully handled many of these types of cases when patients are seriously injured as a result of this type of medical negligence. This should never happen.

We are here to help you if you or a loved one has suffered this type of injury from medical negligence and we are prepared to work as hard as possible to get the maximum compensation for these injuries.