Pritzker | Ruohonen attorneys Fred Pritzker and Elliot Olsen recently secured a $950,000 recovery on behalf of a young man who developed septic arthritis eight days following knee surgery. The suit alleged that the doctors responsible for his care failed to recognize, test and treat his knee infection. Experts retained on behalf of the young man offered evidence that the doctors failed to diagnose septic arthritis, failed to perform arthrocentesis, failed to open the knee capsule and drain out and remove infected fluid and tissue and failed to place the patient on IV antibiotics.

Our client later required massive skin grafting to cover the large leg wound that resulted from the infection. As a result of the damage to the articular cartilage in his knee, the young man will experience pain and increasing disability that will lead to extensive future treatment including knee replacement and perhaps above-the-knee amputation. Read more about the recovery for failure to diagnose septic arthritis.

Posted February 2008.

Labels: failure to diagnose septic arthritis, malpractice lawsuit, septic arthritis