CLAIM FOR DAMAGES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23517, 4 June 1938, Page 21

CLAIM FOR DAMAGES

HOSPITAL BOARD SUED ALLEGATIONS OF NEGLIGENCE DOCTOR’S EVIDENCE DENIED (Per United Press Association) AUCKLAND, June 3. The hearing of a claim for £I6OO general and £213 special damages against the Auckland Hospital Board, based on allegations of negligent and unskilful treatment, was continued before Mr Justice Callan and a jury of 11 in the Supreme Court. The claim was brought by Mrs Mary Margaret Barry, aged 32, of St. Heliers, for whom Mr Sullivan and Mr Winter appeared, who stated that she had been a patient of the Auckland Hospital from January 10. 1937, to October 19, 1937. Plaintiff was operated on on January 11 and on April 11, and she claimed that during one of these operations a swab or other foreign body had been left in her abdomen. This was so concealed that the cause of her resulting injuries was not known to her until after an operation in a private hospital on November 27. Mr V. R. Meredith and Mr McCarthy, who represented the Hospital Board, denied all allegations of negligence, and added the .further defence that the plaintiff had not commenced her action within six months as required. Dr J. W. Bridgman, continuing his evidence, said that, during his operation on Mrs Barry at the Mater Misericordiae Hospital, extra assistance had to be called because of her grave condition. She was given an intravenous saline injection, and he removed a thick-walled cyst about the size of a lemon as the last part of the operation. On examination, he found a small swab of gauze, 2£ inches long by li inches or inches wide, loosely adhering to the inner wall of the cyst. The appearance of part of an X-ray plate explained by witness was stated by him to be consistent with its showing the presence of a swab. “ My own view after having handled the swab,” said witness. “ was that it was a swab.”

In answer to Mr Meredith, witness said he had been six years in New Zealand. He had been at the Wallace and Grey River Hospitals and had been a referee for an insurance society. The bacteriologist’s report did not give any evidence that Mrs Barry was suffering from bacterial peritonitis. Nurse Yates was present, witness said, when a thread came out from Mrs Barry’s wound. The nurse said she thought it was a thread, but • witness said he thought it was not. He said that, as the patient already had ideas of there being a swab or piece of rubber inside her. “As a matter of fact, I was trying to dodge any trouble that might occur,” said witness. What happened at the Auckland Hospital was no concern of his, and he decided to keep the thread business to himself. He did keep it to himself until Mr Sullivan got it out of him. He had told Dr Gwynne that he had found a few layers of gauze. The swab was destroyed when his surgery was changed round in December. Witness said he could not produce it now. If he had, Mr Meredith would have been the first to question it. Witness said he had said to the anaesthetist before the operation that there might be a swab present. After he found this object he discussed its being a swab with Mother Agnes and Dr Maskell, and, if they both denied that, he still said he was stating the truth. “Mother Agnes said to me: ‘ It is a swab,’ and she concealed it under a green covering,” said witness. He had avoided telling the patient that he had found any foreign body. Mr Meredith: Had you no duty to tell her?

Witness; No—no duty to the patient. I am not bound to broadcast from the housetops when a foreign body Is found in a patient. It appeared to me that Mrs Barry was quite content to be made well again, as she never expected to be. Asked why he had left the hospitals in which he had worked, witness said he was tired of doing work that should have been done by twice as many people. He had had a row with a nurse at Grey Hospital, and she claimed that he had assaulted her. There was some trouble at Invercargill, and an allegation against him was dismissed. He should not have mentioned it. Witness denied that the magistrate had referred to the Invercargill affair as "a drunken brawl.” In re-examination by Mr Sullivan, witness said that two of the nurses left the operating theatre at the Mater Hospital shortly after his operation was begun. Mother Agnes was not present when he returned to the theatre to examine the swab. He considered that the treatment of the plaintiff by the responsible authorities of the Mater Hospital was most unfair. In consequence, his relations with that institution were not good, and he refused to go back there. Consequently, the report of his on the operation was not completed. "I have absolutely no pecuniary interest in this case and. I am here much against my will,” said witness. He said he had received a total of £64 from Mrs Barry and she owed him nothing. Dr W. H. Horton said he concluded that, at the time plaintiff went into the Mater Hospital, she was a patient whose illness had begun with a very acute abdominal ailment. At the time he saw her, he concluded that she had a foreign body in her abdomen and he was strengthened in that conclusion by what he had heard in court. In cross-examination, witness said that, if enterostomy had been done on the plaintiff, that was one of the most difficult, worrying and arduous operations a doctor had to perform. It would indicate that the patient was then in a very grave condition. On the evidence he had heard, he felt certain that, if it was not a swab, at least some foreign body was removed. The defence. Mr Meredith said, was that there never was a swab in Mrs Barry. “We are going the whole hog.” he continued, “and we say that when Dr Bridgman says he found a swab he is not telling the truth. There is no halfway house.” Mr Meredith proceeded to outline the history of Mrs Barry’s illness and her treatment first at the Auckland Hospital and later at the Mater Misericordiaa, where she went instead of returning to the Auckland Hospital. The case depended on how much reliance they were going to place on Dr Bridgman, who would be found to be in conflict with many reputable practitioners. Mother Agnes herself went in to the operation because of the rumours about a foreign body that had been started by Dr Bridgman, continued Mr Meredith, and she would give evidence for the defence. She would be supported by others present at the operation who saw nothing of the swab. The hearing was adjourned till Tuesday.