A Maine mom has been awarded $25 million in damages after Mid Coast Medical Group failed to properly diagnose her daughter, negligence that was partly responsible for the 15-year-old girl’s death, a jury found.
Lyndsey Sutherland filed a lawsuit against Mid Coast Medical Group alleging that doctors there were negligent in treating her daughter Jasmine Vincent.
After reporting symptoms including sore, swollen breasts and veins, as well as respiratory issues, Vincent passed away on August 1, 2021.
Later testing revealed that she had been suffering from an acute form of pediatric leukemia, a condition that had gone undiagnosed while she was alive.
In bringing this lawsuit, Sutherland was seeking damages for the loss of her daughter and her companionship, as well as for the way her daughter’s death affected her.
It took the jury only an hour’s worth of deliberation to reach their decision.
Sutherland’s attorney Meryl Poulin spoke to the Portland Press Herald following the jury’s announcement.
“They provided justice for this mother and daughter, that is really just unbelievable,” Poulin said. “That’s really what Lyndsey has continued forward for, to fight for her daughter, to fight for justice for her, and to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
An attorney for Mid Coast reportedly declined to provide a comment to the outlet as of Thursday evening.
It was argued by Sutherland’s legal team that Mid Coast had an obligation to properly investigate the cause of the teenager’s symptoms, which had not previously been observed in a girl her age.
A gynecologist ended up diagnosing her with gynecomastia, a condition typically found in men with a hormonal imbalance.
A week prior, she had been diagnosed with pneumonia and prescribed prednisone, a type of steroid, leading to the development of her more concerning symptoms.
In attempting to diagnose the girl, X-rays were not ordered by the gynecologist, nor were her previous medical records reviewed.
Testimony from two experts revealed that an X-ray likely would have detected the cancer, increasing her chances of survival by allowing for early treatment.
Despite not being aware of any other cases where the use of prednisone had resulted in a teenage girl developing gynecomastia, she proceeded to issue the diagnosis anyway.
When testifying before the court, it became known that the doctor had also failed to read any medical literature on gynecomastia before giving Vincent the diagnosis.
Although the girl’s primary care provider, Martin’s Point, had originally been included in the lawsuit, they were dropped from the case without explanation.
In court, Dr. Danielle Salhany — the gynecologist from Mid Coast who treated Vincent — argued during the two and a half hours she spent on the witness stand that she had only a brief time with the teenager, suggesting that Martin’s Point had already failed the girl by incorrectly diagnosing her with pneumonia.
When asked why she hadn’t fully reviewed the girl’s medical record, the doctor said that she had never received it from Martin’s Point, but the primary care provider testified that they had faxed the paperwork as requested.
Salhany’s attorney argued in court that she acted appropriately based on her limited interactions with the girl and the information available to her.
“They don’t have the benefit of hindsight. They don’t know what the outcome will be when they’re treating a patient,” the attorney said of Salhany and other doctors. “For that reason, it would be unfair to judge…based upon what we know now in hindsight.”
Although defense attorneys indicated that Martin’s Point may bear some responsibility for Vincent’s death, Sutherland’s attorney urged jurors to focus only on the actions of Mid Coast when rendering their decision.
Based upon the arguments presented, the jury found after just an hour of deliberation that the girl’s mother should be awarded a total of $25 million in damages as a result of Mid Coast’s negligence.
