As I stated in an earlier post, eye doctor Dr. John Kiely has been sued by the federal goverment for fruad for allegedly performing unnecessary procedures. Several people have asked me for a copy of the Federal Goverment's civil fraud lawsuit againat eye doctor Dr. John Kiely. Here it is: Download file
A Baltimore eye doctor has been accused by the U.S. government of committing fraud by billing thousands and thousands of dollars for hundreds of unnecessary eye procedures that he performed on dozens of people at an outpatient clinic owned by Bon Secours Hospital. The accusations are set forth in a federal lawsuit which claims that between 10/29/02 and 4/14/09 Dr. John Arthur Kiely performed laser eye surgery on patients who did not need the procedure, and thus falsely billed Medicare and Medicaid for the unnecessary procedures. Dr. Kiely also has offices on St. Paul Street and Mercy Medical Center.
According to the lawsuit, Dr. Kiely sometimes performed the unnecessary procedures multiple times on a single patient, which clearly is medical malpractice. The procedures are alleged to have caused people to suffer unnecessary medical complications, including blindness in one woman. Dr. Kiely has had offices on St. Paul Street and at Mercy Medical Center.
The allegations of against Dr. Kiely sound similar to those against two other Maryland doctors. The first is Dr. Mark G. Midei who has been sued in hundreds of cases for allegedly placing unnecessary cardiac stents into patients at St. Joseph Medical Center in Towson. The second is Dr. John R. McLean, a Salisbury doctor who was criminally indicted for fraud resulting from allegedly placing unnecessary stents in patients at Peninsula Regional Medical Center.
A copy of an excellent newspaper article regarding the case, by Baltimore Sun reporter Tricia Bishop, can be found here. Ms. Bishop is an excellent reporter who has been on the leading edge of stories like this.
If you or a loved one is a victim of Dr. Kiely’s alleged fraud and medical malpractice, call me for a free consultation. As an experienced Baltimore, Maryland medical malpractice lawyer, who also is handling approximately 17 cases against Dr. Midei, I have the expertise to help guide you through the evaluation of your case and pursuant of any claims you may have. These cases are extremely complicated and require expertise that most general personal injury attorneys do not have. To see some of the cases I have handled, click here.
An Indiana jury has awarded a $2.5 million verdict to a former police officer who claimed that his doctor committed medical malpractice by failing to diagnose his colon cancer in 2004. The verdict will be reduced to Indiana’s cap of $1.25 million on medical malpractice cases. The man claimed that he complained of rectal bleeding and other gastric complaints to the doctor, who failed to order either a sigmoidoscopy or colonoscopy to rule out colon cancer, although an upper G.I. test was ordered due to some other complaints. The man later moved to another state and went to another doctor several years later with the same complaint of rectal bleeding. That doctor ordered testing in 2006 that found the cancer was at Stage 4 and incurable. The man now is 42 years old and has been given a prognosis of less than a year to live. A copy of an article regarding the case can be found here.
As an experienced Baltimore, Maryland medical malpractice lawyer, I have handled many medical malpractice and wrongful death cases involving failure to timely diagnose and treat cancer. I have handled failure to diagnose cancer cases alleging medical malpractice involving brain cancer, spinal cord cancer, nasopharyngeal cancer, lung cancer, colon cancer, stomach cancer, bone cancer, etc. A number of these cases involve relatively young people whom the doctors do not suspect of having cancer because the patient does not fall into the typical age group of cancer patients. That can be a catastrophic mistake. Another terrible mistake that doctors make in these type of cases is failing to refer a patient to a specialist when the patient has signs and symptoms that are consistent with cancer. There is no excuse for a doctor who fails to refer a patient to a medical specialist when such a referral is appropriate and available.
The surviving family of a 37 year old Alabama man has won a $3 million jury verdict from a local hospital. The man died a few days after surgery for a duodenal ulcer. The family claimed that the man bled to death after negligent surgery, and negligent follow-up care after discharge. Specifically, the family alleged that the man’s ulcer, a perforation in the first section of the small intestine, was large and not treatable by the standard surgical procedures. The family also alleged that the man was sent home after surgery with a very low blood count and was not adequately examined by his doctor before being discharged. A copy of an article regarding the case can be found here.
I have handled many negligent surgery cases. The key to success in such cases is obtaining all of the relevant medical records, reviewing them carefully, getting a good expert witness and backing the case up with medical literature where appropriate. Also important in such a case is reviewing the medical records to make sure the post-operative care is within the standard of care and not negligent. Usually, this is done by checking the patient’s vital signs (heart rate, breathing rate, blood pressure and temperature), and drainage.
I once handled a case a somewhat similar case of a woman who came into a hospital emergency room with a bleeding ulcer and bleed to death (called exsanguination) within hours. She kept bleeding in the hospital as evidenced by her blood test results which indicated that she was experiencing severe internal bleeding (her hematocrit level kept dropping), but the doctors failed to stop the bleeding. Eventually, her blood pressure crashed and they gave her many units of blood, but by then it was too late to do surgery and she died. That should not happen where there is enough time to operate and stop the bleeding.
As an experienced Baltimore, Maryland medical malpractice lawyer, I have handled a number of medical malpractice cases involving negligent surgery, negligent emergency room or other hospital care and negligent discharge from a hospital. They are extremely complicated and require expertise that most general personal injury attorneys do not have. To see some of the cases I have handled, click here.
A Montana woman and her four children have been awarded a $1.7 million verdict in a medical malpractice / wrongful death case arising from the death of her husband. The family alleged that a doctor failed to properly treat the woman’s husband for a known heart valve condition, commonly referred to as a leaky valve, and that the doctor should have referred the man to a heart specialist after he started having chest pain. Instead, the family alleged that the doctor misdiagnosed the chest pain as a torn muscle. The man died approximately one year later because he did not receive a replacement valve. A copy of an article regarding the case can be found here.
The failure to timely diagnose and treat a heart condition can be a catastrophic event. As an experienced Baltimore, Maryland medical malpractice lawyer, I have handled a number of medical malpractice cases involving failure to timely diagnose heart conditions. Some have involved malpractice in failing to timely diagnose heart attacks, and malpractice relating to the failure to timely diagnose congenital heart deformities. The key to cases like this is to obtain all of the medical records, and have the records reviewed by a competent cardiologist to determine whether the standard of care was met and, if not, whether any major injury resulted. To see some of the cases I have handled, click here.
Nine Maryland hospitals face financial penalties for having far too many patients contracting preventable medical conditions such as infections, pneumonia and bed sores. Those hospitals commtting medical malpractice are Prince George's Hospital Center, Doctors Community Hospital, Laurel Regional Hospital, Union Hospital in Cecil County, Montgomery General Hospital, Civista Medical Center in Southern Maryland, Shady Grove Adventist Hospital, Washington Adventist Hospital and University of Maryland Medical Center. The penalties were handed down by the Maryland Health Services Cost Review Commission, which sets rates that hospitals can charge. The evaluation and penalties are designed to improve patient safety and lower health care costs by linking hospital performance with their payments. A copy of an article regarding the penalties can be found here.
This is an important study because it shows that there is significant malpractice at many of Maryland's hosptials. It also shows that even some of the best hospitals in the state, such as the University of Maryland Medical Center, still have far to go to improve quality of care and reduce the incidence of medical malpractice and wrongful death. In fact, it is interesting to note that, at the same time that this study came out, members of Congress were trying to further limit the rights of victims of medical malpractice by trying to limit damages to $25,000.
