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Well, I'm back from my jaunt to Florida for Sven's surgery. And I'm pissed off and would like everyones opinions on my next step. Particularly you folks with lawlerly experience.
Backstory: Sven had kidney cancer summer of 2002. He lost his right kidney. He's been monitored by a nepherologist/urologist ever since. A couple of years after the surgery his borderline high blood calcium went off the charts and it was decided he had a parathyroid tumor. Kidney doctor refers us to the nearby ENT surgeon, Dr Potatohead, who tells us he's cut out loads of these things, it's a simple thing. He's old but he has a great reputation in our town.
So why is it important for the calcium levels to be low for Sven? Because he keeps getting kidney stones from it in his one kidney, which is an easy way to kill off that one kidney that is already experiencing moderate kidney failure plus years and years and years of high calcium can leach your bones and trash major organs before croaking you off stone cold dead. As irritating as Sven can be sometimes I love the big lug and want him to remain well.
Dr Potatohead does the surgery, tells us he removed two parathyroid glands that had turned into tumors and that Sven still had two normal ones so he'd be fine. Less than one percent of all parathyroid tumor patients develop another one.
Fast forward to this past summer. Huge massive kidney stones, failed kidney stone lithiotripsy and more sky high calcium. Dr Potatohead is suddenly mysteriously out of business this spring and no one knows where he is to even get the records of the first surgery. The new ENT surgeon in the area will not touch Sven because a second surgery would be extremely complex and possibly dangerous. So I do research, the doc does research and we find the one expert in the world on parathyroid tumors in Tampa Florida. We fly down there on Sunday for the surgery Monday morning after a $2,500 consultation fee that insurance won't pay.
Sven's surgery goes well. They find the tumor, it's the size of a grape while those glands are usually the size of a grain of rice. But we're told that Dr Potatohead removed two perfectly healthy parathyroid glands and monkeyed around in there so badly there's lots of scar tissues and damage. They are not even sure that the one remaining parathyroid gland is going to work so they kept a portion of the bad gland in the tissue bank to possibly implant in his arm if the last gland was ruined by Dr Potatohead.
The Florida doctor shows me all the operative reports and pathology reports from Dr Potatohead.
How hard would it be to sue Dr Potatohead for malpractice? Would it be worth it? I've traced Dr Potatohead, he's merely set up practice in another town after being stripped of hospital privileges here.
I am so angry right now I can barely see straight!
Backstory: Sven had kidney cancer summer of 2002. He lost his right kidney. He's been monitored by a nepherologist/urologist ever since. A couple of years after the surgery his borderline high blood calcium went off the charts and it was decided he had a parathyroid tumor. Kidney doctor refers us to the nearby ENT surgeon, Dr Potatohead, who tells us he's cut out loads of these things, it's a simple thing. He's old but he has a great reputation in our town.
So why is it important for the calcium levels to be low for Sven? Because he keeps getting kidney stones from it in his one kidney, which is an easy way to kill off that one kidney that is already experiencing moderate kidney failure plus years and years and years of high calcium can leach your bones and trash major organs before croaking you off stone cold dead. As irritating as Sven can be sometimes I love the big lug and want him to remain well.
Dr Potatohead does the surgery, tells us he removed two parathyroid glands that had turned into tumors and that Sven still had two normal ones so he'd be fine. Less than one percent of all parathyroid tumor patients develop another one.
Fast forward to this past summer. Huge massive kidney stones, failed kidney stone lithiotripsy and more sky high calcium. Dr Potatohead is suddenly mysteriously out of business this spring and no one knows where he is to even get the records of the first surgery. The new ENT surgeon in the area will not touch Sven because a second surgery would be extremely complex and possibly dangerous. So I do research, the doc does research and we find the one expert in the world on parathyroid tumors in Tampa Florida. We fly down there on Sunday for the surgery Monday morning after a $2,500 consultation fee that insurance won't pay.
Sven's surgery goes well. They find the tumor, it's the size of a grape while those glands are usually the size of a grain of rice. But we're told that Dr Potatohead removed two perfectly healthy parathyroid glands and monkeyed around in there so badly there's lots of scar tissues and damage. They are not even sure that the one remaining parathyroid gland is going to work so they kept a portion of the bad gland in the tissue bank to possibly implant in his arm if the last gland was ruined by Dr Potatohead.
The Florida doctor shows me all the operative reports and pathology reports from Dr Potatohead.
How hard would it be to sue Dr Potatohead for malpractice? Would it be worth it? I've traced Dr Potatohead, he's merely set up practice in another town after being stripped of hospital privileges here.
I am so angry right now I can barely see straight!
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