The family of an 8-year old girl who left permanently brain-damaged because of a medical miscommunication will be awarded $15.2 million by the University of Washington as ordered by the court.
This award highlights the serious consequence of proper communication in the medical industry as any form of miscommunication may ruin someone’s life permanently.
The awardee is Mackenzie Briant who has a congenital heart disease but had undergone heart transplant not long after she was born. Her mother Elaine was very cautious of her condition because she is still under medication as maintenance and to boost her weak immune system. Mackenzie caught a cold when she was four in November 2008.
Elaine Briant called Seattle Children's Hospital to ask for a medical advice since Mackenzie had runny nose for several days already. Dr. Cory Noel first received her call and dialed Dr. Yuk Law, the cardiologist who performed Mackenzie’s heart transplant, to discuss the medication allowed on her condition.
Dr. Law told Dr. Noel not to include Afrin on her medication as it could increase her blood pressure but it seemed that Dr. Noel misunderstood the instruction because he included Afrin in the prescription.
Elaine Briant immediately bought the Afrin nasal spray for her daughter and gave it to her. Ten minutes after spraying it, Mackenzie started making strange noise and stopped breathing. She immediately called 911 while administering CPR to her daughter. When the paramedics arrived, they tried to do another CPR before they brought her to the Seattle Children’s Hospital.
The doctors confirmed that Mackenzie had suffered from a major brain damage which could be a permanent condition. The news devastated the family’s life and now had to look after her more than before and perform mental therapy to her. Everything was financially and emotionally damaging for the family.
The family filed a lawsuit against the hospital in which the King County Superior Court judge John Erlick favored them reasoning that the University of Washington Medicine was responsible for the miscommunication and recommendation of Afrin.
The University of Washington and Seattle’s Children Hospital acknowledged that there was really a miscommunication but they also argued that it wasn’t the nasal spray that caused brain damage to Mackenzie but rather a complication of her heart transplant.
Despite the loss in the case, the University of Washington does not plan to appeal according to the Seattle Times.
