Headed for Stanford

[Jackie]

Well, it's a very long story. The 2001 surgery for the colon was successful; HOWEVER, I developed a fever/infection in post-op. The incision was re-opened and I was housebound for over two months with an open wound that wouldn't heal.

Finally, they did a scan and found a surgical sponge had been left inside me. Dr. Pamela Foster (the surgeon) called me to give me the news. She said they had found a sponge on the scan. She admitted that the sponge count at the time of surgery came up wrong (one sponge was missing) but she claimed they did an x-ray and she didn't see it inside me at the time. SO SHE HAD SAID NOTHING TO ME AND MADE NO NOTATION IN THE RECORD OF A SPONGE BEING MISSING... The X-ray (if there was one) was also missing and could not be found.

Long story short, when they discovered the sponge was inside me, of course, they had to re-operate to remove the sponge. They removed it and found it was infected. In addition to receiving tons of antibiotics, the two major abdominal surgeries had now weakened my abdominal wall so much that within 4 months I developed a hernia where the incisions had been made. The hernia was painful and ultimately grew to the size of a large cantaloupe. I had to have 4 more surgeries to fix the hernia. It took over four years to resolve all this, during which time I was in constant pain. I now have a mesh in place of my abdominal wall and still suffer from back pain.

In the malpractice suit, Dr. Foster and Stanford Hospital claimed that there was "no harm" done, even though they had to admit to the retained sponge. They claimed all the complications had nothing to do with them leaving the sponge inside me. Sure!!!

I'm sure this will not happen to you. But the part that is scary is this... I trusted my surgeon to be competent and, even if a mistake is made, to be honest about it and take responsibility for her actions. The fact that she did not mention the missing sponge to me right after the surgery & did not make any mention of it in my medical records AT ALL proves she was not up front with me all along. In my opinion, this is unethical and indefensible. Stanford Medical Center apparently backed her story without really questioning her unethical behavior as far as I could see.

There was a law suit and, after 3 long years, a settlement was made. But it was very limited by the malpractice laws in California, which set a maximum award of $250K to patients (protecting insurance companies) and not nearly sufficient to compensate me for the attorneys, multiple surgeries, and four years of pain and suffering.

Well you asked, so there it is. The surgery turned into a real horror story. The only good news is that my colon (they removed only about 4 inches) now works like it used to. I can eat seeds and nuts which I had to avoid for years prior to the surgery. So, in one way, it was a success. But the recovery should have taken only four weeks instead of four long, painful years. I hope your surgery, if you have it, goes better than mine. All I can say is be very, very careful who your surgeon is...




[This message has been edited by Jackie (edited 03-18-2008).]