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Roetenberger v. Christ Hospital9/30/2005
DECISION.
{ } On July 2, 2001, forty-two-year-old Karen Roetenberger went to The Christ Hospital for endoscopic retrograde cholangio-pancreatography ("ERCP"), an outpatient procedure to remove bile duct stones. Defendant-appellee Dr. Zahid Saeed, a gastroenterologist, performed the procedure. During the ERCP procedure, the surgeon guides a small tube down the patient's esophagus and into the intestines. ERCP is performed while the patient is medicated to a state of "conscious sedation." "Conscious sedation" is achieved through the use of drugs that render the patient calm but responsive.
{ } Approximately fifty minutes into the procedure, Karen Roetenberger's blood oxygen saturation level plummeted. She became hypoxic, a condition characterized by too little oxygen in the blood. The ERCP was aborted and a "code" was called. Karen Roetenberger's oxygen level was restored, but she suffered cardiac arrest. Although The Christ Hospital "code team" was able to resuscitate Karen Roetenberger, she never regained consciousness and she died nine days later.
{ } Karen Roetenberger's husband, plaintiff-appellant John Roetenberger (hereinafter "Roetenberger"), filed a complaint for wrongful death and medical malpractice. Prior to trial, defendants The Christ Hospital and Anesthesia Associates of Cincinnati, Inc., were dismissed. The claims against Saeed and his practice group, defendant-appellee Greater Cincinnati Gastroenterology Associates, Inc. ("GCGA"), were tried to a jury. Following an eleven-day trial, the jury rendered a verdict in favor of Saeed and GCGA. Roetenberger has appealed.
{ } The first assignment of error alleges that the trial court erred in permitting defense counsel to make improper and inflammatory statements to the jury during his closing argument.
{ } During his closing argument, defense counsel stated to the jury, "The plaintiff thinks it's just about money. They think they can just throw it up on the wall and give you some testimony and you will walk back into this courtroom and make them rich people. * * * They don't want a reasoned debate. They have not wanted that from opening statement and they don't want it now. They want money. * * * You have to find that if you are giving all this money. * * * But I suggest to you that that's the type of manipulations going on here for money. * * * That's the medical truth. Not their money truth. * * * What on earth is going on in this case? I'll tell you what's going on. Money. Nine million dollars. Let's get rich on this case at [Dr. Saeed's] expense. * * * It has nothing to do with medicine. It has to do with money. That's all it has to do with. * * * Because [the plaintiff's case is] calculated to try to get you to go back in the jury room and feel terribly sympathetic for this family, this nice guy and his two nice children, and give them nine million dollars, and that's wrong. That would be in my view an absolute wrong thing to do. But they don't care. They just want the money. They come in here and talk about the constitution. You speak for this country. I do not. When you walk back into this courtroom with your verdict it will say a lot of things, a lot of things about this kind of conduct in American courts. And if you want to verify it, if you want to be part of it, that will be your choice. * * * There hasn't been one recognition in this courtroom that [Dr. Saeed is] a human being over there. That's not an ATM machine. * * * Well, you carry back in this courtroom -- whether you agree with that kind of conduct you will carry a verdict back which says yes to that kind of conduct, to that kind of greed, and you'll affirm that behavior. And if you do, that's your prerogative. I don't think y
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