An Alabama grandmother died just hours after a simple procedure after doctors failed to treat her for persistent pain they deemed “normal.”
The death of 71-year-old Anne Davis could have been prevented, according to her family and a jury of 12 unknown defendants who, after just an hour of deliberation, determined that doctors at Wiregrass Surgical in Dothan, Alabama, failed to recognize an infection that led to deadly sepsis.
According to a lawsuit filed by Ms. Davis’s family, two doctors (her surgeon and his partner) dismissed her persistent stomach pain for about two days after surgery to remove her gallbladder.
When a third emergency room doctor finally took her seriously, he discovered her stomach was full of bile. She died that same day, a death her lawyers say could have been prevented.
Anne Davis, 71, died of sepsis in 2017 after her doctors who performed a standard gallbladder removal surgery failed to recognise her symptoms.
Anne Davis underwent surgery in September 2017, one of the most common surgical procedures performed and often done through small incisions and the use of a camera to make recovery quicker and less painful.
But his recovery was anything but painless.
He was given painkillers and discharged from the hospital, with assurances from the surgeon that some pain was to be expected.
Ms. Davis’s husband, Billy, called Wiregrass Surgical about Anne’s symptoms and was again told that pain was a normal side effect, according to the report. The Miami Herald.
On Sept. 22, when the pain was worse than ever, Mr. Davis took his wife to the clinic for help. His surgeon’s partner, Dr. Bradley T. Marker, again said the pain was “normal” and prescribed another painkiller.
His daughter, Betsy Davis Swihart, said: “He told Dad it was OK to send my mom home, and then he pretty much dismissed him and sent him home.”
The doctors’ recommendations to send Ms. Davis home were documented in her medical notes.
Dr Bradley T Marker, a physician at Wiregrass Surgical, admitted to altering her medical records after Ms Davis became septic to make it appear as though he had recommended she go to the hospital sooner, when in fact he told her it would be safe for her to go home.
Anne Davis and her husband Billy (pictured right) were repeatedly told that the severe abdominal pain she had after surgery was “normal” and sent home. When Billy took her to the emergency department, doctors discovered she had an infection causing sepsis.
When the pain worsened later that night, Davis called an emergency medical team to take her to a nearby emergency room. There, doctors finally took her vital signs and performed a more thorough evaluation.
According to the lawsuit, her stomach was “filled with bile.” Under normal circumstances, bile stays inside the bile ducts and gallbladder, but if trauma, such as surgery, causes a leak, bile can spill into the abdominal cavity. From there, bacteria enter the area and cause an infection that must be treated promptly.
While doctors had indicated the first few times they saw Ms. Davis that they approved her returning home, one of them tried to backtrack after she became seriously ill by modifying their earlier recommendation.
Attorney Leon Ashford said: “After (the doctor) comes in and sees her lying in a bed on a respirator and in sepsis, knowing she is going to die, he picks up his dictation machine and dictates a note saying: ‘I told her this morning that she needed to go to the hospital and she refused.’”
A $6 million lawsuit won by the family claimed that Ms. Davis’s death could have been prevented if her doctors had not failed to treat her.
Dr. Marker said on the stand that he was trying to “paint a different narrative” by doing this, leading the jury to acknowledge that he had been blaming the family instead of taking responsibility, according to Ashley Peinhardt, another attorney on the team against Wiregrass Surgical and its doctors.
The family won the case and was awarded $6 million, although they have not yet received it. Davis will never see the sum. In the seven years since he lost his wife, he has developed dementia.
He died last month.
Ms. Swihart, a special education teacher, said, “My father would have done anything to help my mother, and he tried to do everything he could to get her help.”
According to her daughter, Mrs. Davis was “one of those TV moms, one of those 1950s sitcom moms.” She enjoyed gardening, fishing, sewing and raising her grandchildren.
Ms Swihart said: ‘She took my children to school every morning because I had to be at work very early so I didn’t want to have to drag them with me.
“Mom interfered a lot and left some big shoes to fill.”