April 2010.  Deborah A. Aviles obtained a defendant's verdict in Supreme Court, Suffolk County, in a medical malpractice action involving her client, a Long Island hospital.  Plaintiff, a 38 year-old man, fell from the roof of a three-story building and suffered severe trauma to his left foot and ankle, namely a severely comminuted intra-articular fracture of the calcaneus which in and of itself has risks associated with it, including compartment syndrome, a build up in pressure in the foot resulting in muscle death.  The plaintiff was treated at the defendant hospital by an orthopedist who was on call. 

The plaintiff alleged that the doctor and the hospital were negligent in failing to properly monitor, diagnose, and treat compartment syndrome, and that the hospital chart was void of serial neurovascular checks which were the standard.   Post discharge, the plaintiff experienced chronic wound infections, fusion of the joint and eventual below the knee amputation some two years later.  Although the hospital records indicate that there was compartment syndrome after the accident, pathology following the amputation showed no signs of compartment syndrome. 

After a three-week trial, the jury found that the plaintiff’s allegations of compartment syndrome were not merited and that the amputation, which was elective, was due to severe chronic pain as a result of the initial trauma, as per defendant’s contention.