Becker's reported on three multimillion-dollar verdicts in favor of spine patients in 2024.
1. A jury awarded a Texas man, who was left a paraplegic after spine surgery, $6.2 million, according to his lawyers. Mark Silver, MD, performed an elective lumbar spine procedure for Bill Proctor in 2018, the law offices of Laird & McCloskey said in a Feb. 29 news release. Mr. Proctor had surgery to address chronic lower back pain, but Dr. Silver overly stretched or compressed nerves affecting mobility.
2. A man who suffered temporary paralysis after having spine surgery received a $23.87 million verdict. James Spangler had a laminoplasty at WellSpan York (Pa.) Hospital in October 2019. During the procedure his neurosurgeon, Joseph Krzeminski, MD, mistakenly put a screw into the patient's spinal cord. A jury awarded the unanimous verdict after an eight-day trial. It is the largest medical malpractice verdict in York County's history.
3. A patient was awarded $3.16 million in a medical malpractice case involving a spinal surgery from September 2015 that resulted in irreversible nerve damage. In May 2015, Rony Nazarian, MD, a Princeton, N.J.-based orthopedic surgeon. performed the initial surgery on the patient, Jason Rosen, to address a herniated disc. In September 2015, Mr. Rosen underwent a second surgery performed by Harshpal Singh, MD, a Hackensack, N.J.-based orthopedic surgeon, who noted significant damage to the C8 nerve root. The case centered on whether the nerve damage occurred during the first or second surgery.