TOOTH COSTS DENTIST £700

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18025, 25 February 1922, Page 2 (Supplement)

TOOTH COSTS DENTIST £700

DROPPED IN WOMAN'S LUNG. A jury before Supreme Court Justice Laxansky in Brooklyn recently decided that Dr. Victor W. Crossman, dentist, of Brooklyn, must pay £700 for allowing an extracted tooth to fall through Mrs. Cora Minns' windpipe into her left lung. Pneumonia subsequently developed and Mrs. *• Minns died. The verdict was £400 to Mrs. Minns' estate and £300 to her husband, George R. Minns, for loss of her services.

Mrs. Minns, 40 years old and in good health, suffered 'from toothache last spring and consulted Dr. Grossman. It was charged that he placed Mrs, Minns under an anaesthetic and while engaged in extracting a number of teeth allowed one to slip through her windpipe.

When Mrs. Minns reached home she was seized with an attack of coughing, according ,to the testimony, wid suffered'pains in tho chest. Her coughing became worse and it was decided to have lica- taken to (Brooklyn Hospital. Her symptoms indicated pneumonia. She reached the hospital on May 24, 1920, and died soon afterward. An autopsy disclosed a tooth in her lung, it being revealed then for the. first time that she had swallowed a tooth while under dental treatment. Dr. Crossman denied ,oe was responsible for tho woman's [plight,