The Kowalski v. Johns Hopkins verdict is a legal travest

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP,

You are being incredibly insensitive and hurtful to the victims, and you are enabling the perpetrators.

I say this as a scientist and the spouse of a doctor. My husband knows what malpractice looks like in a hospital setting and he'd be the first to tell you that Johns Hopkins deserved to be sued. Stop focusing on the amount of money, and focus on who is responsible for the trauma this family endured.

Shame on you.

Agree. Shame on OP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the fact that there are people like OP who side with a huge bureaucratic organization over a family/patient is astonishing to me.

Happens ALL the time. My DH is a Medical Malpractice attorney. The reality is that winning a MedMal case is HARD because the vast majority of people don’t want to believe that doctors and hospitals make mistakes, operate poorly, etc.

OP here. If a hospital is operating poorly, the state closes it down. A hospital can only operate poorly once, not two times and certainly not three. They'd eventually be caught by state inspectors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If anyone has been following the "Take Care of Maya" trial, the jury awarded the Kowalskis a whooping 7 million against Johns Hopkins. This is such a legal travesty.

When I was in middle school in the early 2000s, my classmate lost her little brother. The entire class made cards that said sorry for your loss, etc. I overheard conversations between teachers and paraprofessionals. They said to each other "if I were the parents, I would sue the hospital" or something along those lines several times.

I do understand it's hard to lose a child, but that doesn't automatically mean the hospital is at fault. If you think the hospital indeed did something wrong, you should be filing a complaint with the state medical board, not suing. They will do an investigation and decide if the hospital is at fault and take appropriate action, including revoking licenses if necessary. There is absolutely no need to sue a hospital ever. It raises healthcare costs for others and of course malpractice insurance, so no one will want to become a doctor because they are afraid some crazy person will sue them.

This is one of the reasons we have a teacher shortage. A teacher does something a parent doesn't like, a parent raises hell left and right with the administration or even sue the district for millions. Just look at the Savanna Redding case. The parent sued after the school strip-searched on suspicion she has drugs. If they had not strip-searched her and someone died of the drugs another parent would sue the school. Damned of you do, damned if you don't.

And here a family got $7 million just because they don't like a licensed child abuse pediatrics specialist doctor claimed Beata had Munchausen's. Now parents with Munchausen's can get $7 million by claiming licensed Hippocratic sworn doctors are fraudsters.

My sister did this. She decided the school the district wanted to put my autistic niece in is a bad school, so she got an attorney to bully the district into placing my niece in a different school. She calls this "advocating" for her child. My parents are Polish just like the Kowalskis and adwokat means lawyer in Polish and other languages. The last thing you should be doing is suing others.

I don't think those are mutually exclusive. I am a hospital nurse and I agree that people are sue happy in the US. People use it as a threat all the time when they don't get what they want in the hospital. And it can be stressful for all involved on the receiving end. But--having worked in health care--I think you are naive about how hospitals handle bad or negligent health care providers. Ask most hospital nurses-they all know at least one surgeon they would never let touch a family member because they have messed up so many times. But the hospitals look the other way despite concerns being raised bc it costs them money. A lot of hospitals settle out of court. It is actually not as easy as people make it seem to sue--there needs to be evidence of harm and dereliction of duty.

OP here. If a surgeon is indeed messing up so many times that they shouldn't be practicing, then the hospital is required to fire the surgeon. Moreover, the state will investigate and take away their license if necessary. Hospitals are over-regulated as it is. If you couldn't do your job right, the state would take away your license too. That's how it works.

That's not what hospitals do, though, as that would invite a lawsuit by the physician against the hospital. So in most cases, absolutely nothing happens. If the physician is sufficiently dangerous, then the hospital will reach an agreement with the physician where they agree not to provide a negative reference to the physician's future employers.

OP here. OP here. No. If the physician is sufficiently dangerous, the hospital reports it to the state medical board. The state medical board conducts an investigation. If they determine the physician is indeed sufficiently dangerous, they will revoke the physicians license permanently and the physician will never be allowed to practice in any state again ever. If they find the physician just needs more education, they will require the physician to take more courses. If they find the physician did nothing wrong, than case closed. Hospitals do not and cannot legally cover up for dangerous physicians. The state will shut down the hospital immediately, or at least fire and revoke the licenses of pertinent people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the fact that there are people like OP who side with a huge bureaucratic organization over a family/patient is astonishing to me.

Happens ALL the time. My DH is a Medical Malpractice attorney. The reality is that winning a MedMal case is HARD because the vast majority of people don’t want to believe that doctors and hospitals make mistakes, operate poorly, etc.

OP here. If a hospital is operating poorly, the state closes it down. A hospital can only operate poorly once, not two times and certainly not three. They'd eventually be caught by state inspectors.

But, by your logic, individuals can be harmed significantly before any actions are taken. So what? They shouldn't be compensated because they were before the shut down?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If anyone has been following the "Take Care of Maya" trial, the jury awarded the Kowalskis a whooping 7 million against Johns Hopkins. This is such a legal travesty.

When I was in middle school in the early 2000s, my classmate lost her little brother. The entire class made cards that said sorry for your loss, etc. I overheard conversations between teachers and paraprofessionals. They said to each other "if I were the parents, I would sue the hospital" or something along those lines several times.

I do understand it's hard to lose a child, but that doesn't automatically mean the hospital is at fault. If you think the hospital indeed did something wrong, you should be filing a complaint with the state medical board, not suing. They will do an investigation and decide if the hospital is at fault and take appropriate action, including revoking licenses if necessary. There is absolutely no need to sue a hospital ever. It raises healthcare costs for others and of course malpractice insurance, so no one will want to become a doctor because they are afraid some crazy person will sue them.

This is one of the reasons we have a teacher shortage. A teacher does something a parent doesn't like, a parent raises hell left and right with the administration or even sue the district for millions. Just look at the Savanna Redding case. The parent sued after the school strip-searched on suspicion she has drugs. If they had not strip-searched her and someone died of the drugs another parent would sue the school. Damned of you do, damned if you don't.

And here a family got $7 million just because they don't like a licensed child abuse pediatrics specialist doctor claimed Beata had Munchausen's. Now parents with Munchausen's can get $7 million by claiming licensed Hippocratic sworn doctors are fraudsters.

My sister did this. She decided the school the district wanted to put my autistic niece in is a bad school, so she got an attorney to bully the district into placing my niece in a different school. She calls this "advocating" for her child. My parents are Polish just like the Kowalskis and adwokat means lawyer in Polish and other languages. The last thing you should be doing is suing others.

I don't think those are mutually exclusive. I am a hospital nurse and I agree that people are sue happy in the US. People use it as a threat all the time when they don't get what they want in the hospital. And it can be stressful for all involved on the receiving end. But--having worked in health care--I think you are naive about how hospitals handle bad or negligent health care providers. Ask most hospital nurses-they all know at least one surgeon they would never let touch a family member because they have messed up so many times. But the hospitals look the other way despite concerns being raised bc it costs them money. A lot of hospitals settle out of court. It is actually not as easy as people make it seem to sue--there needs to be evidence of harm and dereliction of duty.

OP here. If a surgeon is indeed messing up so many times that they shouldn't be practicing, then the hospital is required to fire the surgeon. Moreover, the state will investigate and take away their license if necessary. Hospitals are over-regulated as it is. If you couldn't do your job right, the state would take away your license too. That's how it works.

That's not what hospitals do, though, as that would invite a lawsuit by the physician against the hospital. So in most cases, absolutely nothing happens. If the physician is sufficiently dangerous, then the hospital will reach an agreement with the physician where they agree not to provide a negative reference to the physician's future employers.

OP here. OP here. No. If the physician is sufficiently dangerous, the hospital reports it to the state medical board. The state medical board conducts an investigation. If they determine the physician is indeed sufficiently dangerous, they will revoke the physicians license permanently and the physician will never be allowed to practice in any state again ever. If they find the physician just needs more education, they will require the physician to take more courses. If they find the physician did nothing wrong, than case closed. Hospitals do not and cannot legally cover up for dangerous physicians. The state will shut down the hospital immediately, or at least fire and revoke the licenses of pertinent people.

You clearly don't work in medicine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If anyone has been following the "Take Care of Maya" trial, the jury awarded the Kowalskis a whooping 7 million against Johns Hopkins. This is such a legal travesty.

When I was in middle school in the early 2000s, my classmate lost her little brother. The entire class made cards that said sorry for your loss, etc. I overheard conversations between teachers and paraprofessionals. They said to each other "if I were the parents, I would sue the hospital" or something along those lines several times.

I do understand it's hard to lose a child, but that doesn't automatically mean the hospital is at fault. If you think the hospital indeed did something wrong, you should be filing a complaint with the state medical board, not suing. They will do an investigation and decide if the hospital is at fault and take appropriate action, including revoking licenses if necessary. There is absolutely no need to sue a hospital ever. It raises healthcare costs for others and of course malpractice insurance, so no one will want to become a doctor because they are afraid some crazy person will sue them.

This is one of the reasons we have a teacher shortage. A teacher does something a parent doesn't like, a parent raises hell left and right with the administration or even sue the district for millions. Just look at the Savanna Redding case. The parent sued after the school strip-searched on suspicion she has drugs. If they had not strip-searched her and someone died of the drugs another parent would sue the school. Damned of you do, damned if you don't.

And here a family got $7 million just because they don't like a licensed child abuse pediatrics specialist doctor claimed Beata had Munchausen's. Now parents with Munchausen's can get $7 million by claiming licensed Hippocratic sworn doctors are fraudsters.

My sister did this. She decided the school the district wanted to put my autistic niece in is a bad school, so she got an attorney to bully the district into placing my niece in a different school. She calls this "advocating" for her child. My parents are Polish just like the Kowalskis and adwokat means lawyer in Polish and other languages. The last thing you should be doing is suing others.

I don't think those are mutually exclusive. I am a hospital nurse and I agree that people are sue happy in the US. People use it as a threat all the time when they don't get what they want in the hospital. And it can be stressful for all involved on the receiving end. But--having worked in health care--I think you are naive about how hospitals handle bad or negligent health care providers. Ask most hospital nurses-they all know at least one surgeon they would never let touch a family member because they have messed up so many times. But the hospitals look the other way despite concerns being raised bc it costs them money. A lot of hospitals settle out of court. It is actually not as easy as people make it seem to sue--there needs to be evidence of harm and dereliction of duty.

OP here. If a surgeon is indeed messing up so many times that they shouldn't be practicing, then the hospital is required to fire the surgeon. Moreover, the state will investigate and take away their license if necessary. Hospitals are over-regulated as it is. If you couldn't do your job right, the state would take away your license too. That's how it works.

That's not what hospitals do, though, as that would invite a lawsuit by the physician against the hospital. So in most cases, absolutely nothing happens. If the physician is sufficiently dangerous, then the hospital will reach an agreement with the physician where they agree not to provide a negative reference to the physician's future employers.

OP here. OP here. No. If the physician is sufficiently dangerous, the hospital reports it to the state medical board. The state medical board conducts an investigation. If they determine the physician is indeed sufficiently dangerous, they will revoke the physicians license permanently and the physician will never be allowed to practice in any state again ever. If they find the physician just needs more education, they will require the physician to take more courses. If they find the physician did nothing wrong, than case closed. Hospitals do not and cannot legally cover up for dangerous physicians. The state will shut down the hospital immediately, or at least fire and revoke the licenses of pertinent people.

Lol. None of this is true. State medical boards generally do more than a gentle slap on the wrist.

[Anonymous]

Doctors abdicated their administrative control to lawyers long ago. OP, you must be the last person who still thinks doctors are in charge

[Anonymous]

Not worth arguing with OP, who is clearly a medical professional or married to a medical professional, possibly one who has been sued before due to negligence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They took the 10 year old daughter away from the family and isolated her, and the mother ended up killing herself. This case is a bit more egregious than the ones you’re comparing it to.

This is the part that is not sympathetic. The mother was clearly crazy. This fact makes me much more sympathetic to the hospital - the family was incapable of properly caring for the girl.

Yup. The mother committing suicide while her daughter was in the hospital’s care confirms that she was mentally incompetent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They took the 10 year old daughter away from the family and isolated her, and the mother ended up killing herself. This case is a bit more egregious than the ones you’re comparing it to.

This is the part that is not sympathetic. The mother was clearly crazy. This fact makes me much more sympathetic to the hospital - the family was incapable of properly caring for the girl.

Yup. The mother committing suicide while her daughter was in the hospital’s care confirms that she was mentally incompetent.

Interesting. That implies you can never consent to medically assisted suicide.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the fact that there are people like OP who side with a huge bureaucratic organization over a family/patient is astonishing to me.

Happens ALL the time. My DH is a Medical Malpractice attorney. The reality is that winning a MedMal case is HARD because the vast majority of people don’t want to believe that doctors and hospitals make mistakes, operate poorly, etc.

OP here. If a hospital is operating poorly, the state closes it down. A hospital can only operate poorly once, not two times and certainly not three. They'd eventually be caught by state inspectors.

Eventually? Wouldn't they have been caught the first time by the magical inspectors?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just watched the documentary. What a hearbreaking story. Yes, I understand CPS having to investigate. But two doctors who had treated Maya collaborated the mother's story of the diagnosis and recommended treatment. But Johns Hopkins didn't agree. During the investigation, the Kowalski's lawyers discovered that the doctors at Johns Hopkins did treat Maya with the same medicine her original doctor had prescribed - so they must have agreed with the diagnosis of Complex Regional Pain Syndrome and knew that the course of treatment worked. I normally don't agree with suing, but in this case it was 100% warranted.

More than that, the hospital actually billed her insurance under the diagnosis of Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. There was never any alternative diagnosis other than Munchausen by proxy which obviously got ruled out pretty quick as she was still sick despite total separation from the family. The professional conduct of the medical doctors involved was sick as f&ck too. They celebrated the suicide of her Mother.

The is pretty commonplace. They billed under the working diagnosis. The hospital is going to bill the patient’s insurance no matter what, with or without an official diagnosis.

Often times a patient begins treatment under one working diagnosis, but then a lab result comes in that forces a change in the diagnosis - the hospital still gets paid for what it did under the working diagnosis.

In this case, JH billed under the working diagnosis. Even while exploring other options. I feel like this is common practice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just watched the documentary. What a hearbreaking story. Yes, I understand CPS having to investigate. But two doctors who had treated Maya collaborated the mother's story of the diagnosis and recommended treatment. But Johns Hopkins didn't agree. During the investigation, the Kowalski's lawyers discovered that the doctors at Johns Hopkins did treat Maya with the same medicine her original doctor had prescribed - so they must have agreed with the diagnosis of Complex Regional Pain Syndrome and knew that the course of treatment worked. I normally don't agree with suing, but in this case it was 100% warranted.

More than that, the hospital actually billed her insurance under the diagnosis of Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. There was never any alternative diagnosis other than Munchausen by proxy which obviously got ruled out pretty quick as she was still sick despite total separation from the family. The professional conduct of the medical doctors involved was sick as f&ck too. They celebrated the suicide of her Mother.

The is pretty commonplace. They billed under the working diagnosis. The hospital is going to bill the patient’s insurance no matter what, with or without an official diagnosis.

Often times a patient begins treatment under one working diagnosis, but then a lab result comes in that forces a change in the diagnosis - the hospital still gets paid for what it did under the working diagnosis.

In this case, JH billed under the working diagnosis. Even while exploring other options. I feel like this is common practice.

The issue wasn't the diagnosis, it was the treatment, and the fact that the mother was unreasonable, difficult, impossible. And possibly dangerous to her child. Her suicide didn't exactly prove otherwise.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just watched the documentary. What a hearbreaking story. Yes, I understand CPS having to investigate. But two doctors who had treated Maya collaborated the mother's story of the diagnosis and recommended treatment. But Johns Hopkins didn't agree. During the investigation, the Kowalski's lawyers discovered that the doctors at Johns Hopkins did treat Maya with the same medicine her original doctor had prescribed - so they must have agreed with the diagnosis of Complex Regional Pain Syndrome and knew that the course of treatment worked. I normally don't agree with suing, but in this case it was 100% warranted.

More than that, the hospital actually billed her insurance under the diagnosis of Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. There was never any alternative diagnosis other than Munchausen by proxy which obviously got ruled out pretty quick as she was still sick despite total separation from the family. The professional conduct of the medical doctors involved was sick as f&ck too. They celebrated the suicide of her Mother.

The is pretty commonplace. They billed under the working diagnosis. The hospital is going to bill the patient’s insurance no matter what, with or without an official diagnosis.

Often times a patient begins treatment under one working diagnosis, but then a lab result comes in that forces a change in the diagnosis - the hospital still gets paid for what it did under the working diagnosis.

In this case, JH billed under the working diagnosis. Even while exploring other options. I feel like this is common practice.

The issue wasn't the diagnosis, it was the treatment, and the fact that the mother was unreasonable, difficult, impossible. And possibly dangerous to her child. Her suicide didn't exactly prove otherwise.

+1 the hospital saved Maya's life

[Anonymous]

Something was very psychologically off with both Beata and Maya. I think the hospital did some things that were not right, but calling CPS on Beata was a no-brainer.

https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Ftvlrk1tqgrxb1.jpeg%3Fwidth%3D2436%26format%3Dpjpg%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3D726a31477d82fd2693da5bcfef5f630857335599

https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F8z056h63clxb1.jpg