New York Woman Dies During Surgery in Dominican Republic
The tragic story of a woman from New York, who traveled to the Dominican Republic to get an inexpensive tummy tuck and liposuction, dramatically highlights the dangers that patients can face from surgical errors and medical malpractice.
According to a news source, Beverly Brignoni, a 28-year old mother of a young daughter, unexpectedly suffered a massive pulmonary embolism and died on the operating table during her surgery on February 20, 2014. Brignoni’s family suspected that surgical error or medical negligence caused her death. Investigators who have looked into Brignoni’s death believe that doctors failed to give Brignoni a proper medical evaluation before her surgery began. Specifically, the doctors may have failed to consider the enhanced risk of embolism that resulted from the fact that Brignoni sat on an airplane for several hours just before her surgery began.
Brignoni had paid Dominican doctors approximately $6300 for liposuction, a tummy tuck, and breast implant surgery. The Dominican hospital where the surgery was performed was able to offer such low-cost surgical procedures due to the relative lack of regulation and lax safety standards that govern their operations.
The Centers for Disease Control recently published a warning to Americans about the risk of contracting dangerous bacterial infections from surgeries in the Dominican Republic. According to the CDC, 19 women have suffered a serious personal injury because of infections contracted during surgery in Dominican hospitals. The State Department has also recently posted warnings to American travelers noting that several U.S. citizens have suffered serious complications or died during surgeries in the Dominican Republic.
Risks to Patients From Surgical Error
Cheap cosmetic surgeries abroad clearly possess enhanced risks to patients. However, medical malpractice, surgical errors, and hospital negligence occur in this country as well, and the consequences of surgical error can be devastating. In Beverly Brignoni’s case, surgical errors cost a young woman her life, and a left a four-year-old girl without her mother. In other cases, babies have been born with permanent injuries due to errors occurring during birth through cesarean section, and other patients have suffered life-long pain from improperly conducted surgical procedures. Surgical errors can include any mistake that is made during surgery. For example:
- Misdiagnosis leading to unnecessary surgery
- Surgery performed on the wrong body part
- Damage to organs due to surgery
- Improper treatment of the wound area leading to infection
- Leaving surgical tools inside the body
- Improperly closing surgical wounds preventing proper healing
- Overdose of anesthesia
Contact NY Personal Injury Attorneys Peters Berger Koshel & Goldberg, P.C.
Surgical errors can result in a lifetime of pain and loss to the patient and his or her family. If you have suffered due to surgical error, it is important that you contact an experienced New York surgical error attorney right away. The medical malpractice attorneys at Peters, Berger, Koshel, & Goldberg, P.C., provide skilled, effective representation to clients who have been victims of surgical error. Contact Peters, Berger, Koshel & Goldberg today at 718-596-7800 or 1-800-836-7801.