$3 Million Settlement Recovered by Attorney Andrew Swartz

Andrew Swartz of Swartz, & Kennedy recently recovered a $3 million settlement for a client. Working together with Spencer Pahlke of San Francisco-based firm Walkup, Melodia, Kelly & Schoenberger, Attorney Swartz fought to protect his client’s rights after she received negligent treatment that jeopardized her life and resulted in permanent physical damage.

A 50-year-old athletic woman was suffering from a wide variety of symptoms including gastric pain and high fever in the Lake Tahoe area of California and went to the emergency department at the local hospital. After a variety of tests revealed that she was likely suffering from an infection, the attending doctor discharged her and sent her home.

By the next morning, our client’s symptoms were significantly worse. She was readmitted to the emergency room and went into septic shock, necessitating an emergency transfer to a better-equipped hospital in Reno. Our client went into a coma and woke up 40 days later to several of her fingers and toes having been amputated and a sepsis-related brain injury.

Our Attorneys Fought to Demonstrate Negligence

Our client retained a legal team featuring Mr. Pahlke and Mr. Swartz, and working together, they set out trying to acquire evidence to show that the attending physician acted negligently by discharging her when she was clearly in need of serious medical attention on her first visit. When tests revealed a serious infection, the attending doctor simply prescribed medication and sent our client on her way, refusing to offer any more serious and largely necessary treatments that could have prevented her symptoms from worsening and causing her to fall into a coma.

Our client enjoyed an active life of athletics and exercise, which made her a picture of good health. However, when she sustained the infection, the doctor’s decision not only robbed her of that health, but also of her quality of life, as she could no longer enjoy many of the physical activities she enjoyed so often previously.

Relying on Experts to Prove the Damages

Attorneys Swartz and Pahlke focused their strategy on understanding the nature of their client’s injuries, including why they occurred and how they could have been prevented with better, more diligent care and clearer decision-making. They worked with experts in neuropsychology, vocational rehabilitation, physical medicine and rehabilitation, life care planning, prosthetics, and economic loss to determine just how extensive our client’s losses were, and then filed a demand letter against the attending physician’s insurance company, citing negligent care.

Before the case could reach trial, the parties agreed to a settlement for a value of $3 million, which will help compensate their client for lost quality of life, disability, continual treatment, required medical equipment, extensive rehabilitation, and much more.