Last May, Emily Reardon, a 19-year-old college freshman and former high school varsity swimmer, was brought by her parents to the Riverside Methodist Hospital emergency department (ED) in Columbus, Ohio, with severe respiratory distress and low pulse-oximetry readings. She was treated by an emergency physician…..medscape.com, How Likely Are Malpractice Lawsuits From Treating COVID? Harris Meyer, 2021
It looked like a case of COVID-19. But after testing negative three times for the virus, Reardon was sent home with her parents with a diagnosis of pneumonia and prescriptions for an antibiotic and acetaminophen. She returned 2 days later in respiratory distress with a dangerously low pulse-oximetry reading of 70%. She died 8 hours later.
Her death certificate listed the cause as acute respiratory distress syndrome, according to a medical malpractice lawsuit filed last June against the hospital, the emergency physician, and other ED staff in state court in Franklin County.
The suit alleged failure to properly diagnose and treat Reardon’s symptoms and failure to adequately monitor her serious and rapidly declining condition, calling the care “negligent and/or reckless.“
The facts suggest that this is the kind of coronavirus-related negligence case that has physicians, hospitals, liability insurers, and malpractice defense attorneys on high alert.
3 comments
Emily Reardon is my daughter. I was not able to open and read the full article (articale was misspelled). Please send the full article to me. Thanks for your assistance! Jim Reardon,PhD I have additional information I would like to send you, please indicate the appropriate email address.
I’m sorry for your loss, but why are you actually suing them? Based on what the article discusses, your suing the people in the ED where she died at? That sounds extremely unreasonable as they had only a small window of being able to see her and identify what is going on. If she was in that bad of shape, why didn’t you have her come back in the next day instead of 2 days later? I don’t think a lawsuit is going to help you or any of her other loved ones heal but that’s just my personal opinion. Perhaps I’m missing the whole story on this though. Again, sorry for you loss.
Ariel, people sue so that hospitals learn some kind of lesson and they change their ways. If you don’t take their money, they continue to defecate on the faces of their patients and tell them to eat it, while they laugh at them. Because, why not? You don’t have a brain if you don’t understand hoe an ED should have watched and better treated that girl. I hope someone fails you just as brutally.