Not Guilty Verdict Obtained for ER Physician

On March 21, 2005, Vito Masciopinto achieved a not guilty verdict for an emergency room physician and the physician corporation. The plaintiff, a 54 year-old man, presented to the Northwest Community Hospital Department on December 28, 2000 with complaints of numbness in his right arm, tingling of lips, and, by history, left arm and left shoulder pain. He denied chest pain or shortness of breath. The physician defendant examined the decedent, ordered a CT scan of the brain, and an EKG to rule out atrial fibrillation as cause of a potential transischemic attack. The EKG did not reveal atrial fibrillation, but was abnormal and suggestive of a prior myocardial infarction.

Finding no acute process, the physician discharged the decedent with a diagnosis of anxiety and parasthesias and instructed him to follow up with his physician. The decendent died on February 21, 2001, and autopsy revealed severe (95% blockage of major coronary arteries) coronary artery disease. Plaintiff alleged negligence for failure to consider a cardiac etiology of decedent's complaints (in light of the abnormal EKG) and for failure to arrange for cardiac monitoring before discharge. The defense argued that plaintiff was appropriately worked up for his presenting complaint, was not in acute distress and did not require a cardiac workup.

The trial, presided over by Judge Thomas Hogan lasted ten days. The plaintiffs asked for $3.9 million in damages. The jury was out for less then two hours.