HOSPITAL BOARD SUED

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22418, 3 June 1938, Page 7

HOSPITAL BOARD SUED

Patient’s Action In Auckland NEGLECT IN OPERATION ALLEGED (TRESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.) AUCKLAND, June 2. A claim for £I6OO general damages and. £213 special damages was made against the Auckland. Hospital Board in the Supreme Court by- Mrs Mary. Margaret Barry, aged 32, before Mr Justice Callan and a , jury of 11. The panel of jurors proved insufficient, and only the consent of counsel to proceed with 11 jurors prevented the unusual procedure of “praying a tales,” or enlisting a - juror from among the persons in Court from being coopted. • In her statement of claim, plaintiff said she was a „ patient at the Auckland Hospital from January 10, 1937, to October 19, 1937. On January, 11 and on April 7 she was operated on by doctors in the board’s employ, and attended to. by the matron and nursing staff.' During one of these operations a'swab or foreign body was left in the plaintiff’s abdomen. It was covered over, or so concealed that the cause of her resulting injuries was not known to her until after an operation on November 27. ■ It was claimed that the, defendant, through its' servants, had negligently failed to ascertain the presence of the swab, and had negligently or incompetently treated her. Plaintiff had to enter a private hospital on November 19, and the swab was removed, since -when she had improved steadily in health: but still suffered from injuries caused by the alleged negligent acts of the defendant and its servants. She was unable to attend to her household duties, had for some months beep almost unable to walk, .and her expectation of life had been considerably. shortened. The Defence The defence admitted that* the plaintiff was. a patient from January .10 to February 15, from April 6 to July 30, from August 10 to October 19, and at the convalescent home from February 15 to April 6; but-denied all the other allegations, and set up a further or alternative defence that the plaintiff had failed to commence her' action •within six months of the date of the acts of which she complained. Plaintiff gave evidence on,the.lines of her statement of claim,- She said she discussed her case with Dr. Bridgeman, and after refusing, to go back to the Auckland Hospital, went to the Mater Misericordiae Hospital, where she was operated on by Dr. Bridgeman. , When she first went to see him, her health was so - bad that she seriously thought of taking all the tablets she had. After Dr. Bridgeman’s operation the pain ceased. Plaintiff said she had asked Dr. Bridgeman what he had found, and he said she was lucky to be alive. Cross-examined, witness said Dr. Bridgeman had removed a swab, not a diseased ovary with, a cyst. One member of the private hospital staff told her the ovary had been removed; but Dr. Bridgeman told her it would have been an impossibility to do it; He told her before-he operated that he would, not operate unless he had definite evidence that there .was a foreign body; in her. Doctor’s Evidence Dr. J. W. Bridgeman said he first saw the .plaintiff early ,in -November, 1937. She was. then practically; “skin and.bone.',’ As the result of an. examination, he came to the' conclusion that there was a foreign body -in the plaintiff’s abdomen. Later she - was admitted to the. Mater Misericordiae Hospital. A piece of thread was washed out from one of the sinuses one day before the operation, when the body was removed, which had the appearance of a small, swab or piece pf dead tissue. He-did not know what it was. A. thick-walled abscessed cavity was also removed, witness continued, and later he removed from its side; a swab that was lightly adhering to it. His opinion about the other specimen was that it . was a', piece .of debris which had been .dislodged from the swab by the washing out process. He could not say how long it had been there. In his case-notes on the plaintiff, witness said; there was no-mention of an ovary or ■ swab. The first time he mentioned the swab was in a letter to Mr Sullivan, plaintiff’s counsel, in .March,, The reason for his’ reticence was that he did not want to be mixed up in any trouble between Mrs Barry and the Auckland Hospital. • ■ , The hearing was adjourned.