Miami Injury Attorney Blog

A lawsuit was filed in the case of the death by suicide of a Broward 30-year-old man whose family alleges became addicted to painkillers and anti-anxiety drugs that were supplied in excessive quantities by a Fort Lauderdale doctor and his pain clinic.

The lawsuit alleges that Dr. Michael Lazzopina of the Fort Lauderdale Pain Relief Center turned his patient, Benjamin Eiseman, into a drug addict with prescriptions for a constant flow of addictive painkillers and anxiety drugs from 2005 to 2008. Eiseman committed suicide with an overdose of pills prescribed from the pain clinic for his back pain. The drugs included oxycodone, which the suit indicates was prescribed months before the doctor received test results to verify the injury.

According to the lawsuit, Dr. Lazzopina failed to exercise the proper standard of care and reduce the oxycodone dosage after Eiseman's condition improved. It also appears that the doctor erred by never referring his patient to a drug addiction specialist. A December article on the case from The Miami Herald indicates that the doctor, who specializes in urology, advertises detoxification treatments for drug addicts and pain-management treatments in local newspapers. The article also states that the Fort Lauderdale Pain Relief Center is owned by Integra Health Services, a company whose founders also created an MRI facility in eastern Kentucky, which it says has become "a hotbed of illegal trafficking of painkillers from South Florida pain clinics."

Doctors who prescribe addictive painkillers and anxiety drugs owe a duty to their patients and the public to take adequate precautions to help ensure that their patients do not become addicted to the medications. During the last several years, South Florida has become one of the country's chief suppliers of black-market painkillers, and Broward alone is home to 33 of the 50 doctors who dispense the most oxycodone in the country, according to data from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. As this trend continues, our attorneys will continue to offer free and confidential consultations to the victims and their families of these unscrupulous healthcare providers who put profits over the health and wellness of their patients.

When pharmacy and medication errors resulting in serious injuries and sometimes even fatalities take place in Miami and other parts of the country, Florida medical malpractice lawyers such as those at our firm are called on by the victims and their families to turn to our justice system for help. Such was the case in early in mid-Dec. when a law firm filed a lawsuit against a pharmacy that is accused of dispensing the wrong dosage of a drug, which the suit alleges caused the death of a 54 year-old cancer patient.

The lawsuit indicates that John Sheridan had been prescribed the drug Temodar as part of his cancer treatment, but the prescription and dosage that was supplied to him was nearly 10 times the correct amount. As a result, he died within a month of taking the exorbitant dosage of the medication.

With the counsel and guidance of their attorneys in Detroit, the Sheridan family has entered into a confidential settlement with his oncologist, but they have decided to pursue the case against Rite Aid, the pharmacy. The family's attorneys reason that the pharmacists are highly trained specialists who owe a duty to the safety of the public to recognize such a blatant error and contact the prescribing physician for a clarification.

Over the years, we have seen similar lawsuits involving doctors and pharmacies making serious and sometimes fatal drug errors in Miami and throughout South Florida. Lawsuits involving prescription and medication errors help the victims and their families to turn to the justice system in order to force those who are responsible to provide restitution for their negligence or inability to follow the accepted standards of practice.

Continue reading "Pharmacy Error Lawsuit Results from Death of Victim" »

Lawsuits against hospitals involving the death of a patient often result from poor and inadequate medical attention by physicians and the medical staff. The Miami attorneys of Gamba Lombana recently read about a lawsuit that alleges such negligence caused the death of a female patient in California.

In November 2008, 57-year-old Penny Prevezich died after she arrived at the San Mateo Medical Center and was left unattended for approximately 90 minutes in the waiting area; where she stopped breathing and entered complete cardiac arrest. The lawsuit alleges that the hospital "carelessly and negligently managed the care of [the victim and] failed to monitor and supervise her."

According to HealthGrades, the leading independent healthcare ratings organization, an estimated 195,000 people died in 2000, 2001 and 2002 due to potentially preventable medical errors.

Continue reading "Negligence by Hospital Staff Leads to Wrongful Death Lawsuit" »