Family get compensation after woman dies due to hospital ‘malpractice’ in Spain

THE Superior Court of Justice of Andalucia has ruled that the Ministry of Health and the Costa del Sol Hospital in Marbella is to pay over 185,000 euros in compensation to the family of a woman who died due to a misdiagnosis and poor follow-up.
A 69-year-old woman died due to a diagnostic error and poor follow-up after attending the hospital in Marbella on the Costa del Sol.
The court heard that the deceased woman suffered a fall in March 2015 and was subsequently rushed to the Emergency Department of the Costa del Sol Hospital.
Despite reporting “intense pains” to staff at the hospital, the woman was discharged after routine tests were carried out, according to a statement released by The Patient Advocate.
The woman was reportedly bed bound in the days after her release from hospital and her family were forced to call 061 emergency services after she complained that her pain was progressively intensifying.
061 professionals injected the woman with anti-inflammatory medicines and attributed the pain to the impact injuries she suffered during her fall.
After her suffering continued, 061 emergency services were called out once again the following day and the woman was transferred back to the Costa del Sol hospital to undergo a CT scan which detected “multiple fractures” in her spine with the “displacement of the posterior wall”.
The woman underwent surgery on April 9, 2015, eleven days after the fall on March 29, 2015.
Lawyer, Damián Vázquez denounced in court the deficient monitoring of the woman in the days after her operation after the surgical wound starting oozing, requiring the 061 emergency services to be called once more to the woman’s home.
A consultation report noted the woman’s surgical dressings were “stained abundantly” and the woman had to return to the Costa del Sol hospital.
The Patient Advocate claim in their statement the Costa del Sol Hospital failed to pay attention: “to possible infectious process with obvious malpractice”.
Again, the woman was discharged from hospital once her dressings were replaced.
A hospital analysis showed the presence of: “severe sepsis secondary to surgical wound infection in the postoperative spinal fusion arthrodesis” and the woman underwent a second surgery on April 26, 2015 at the Costa del Sol hospital.
The woman suffered from a “refractory septic shock, oligoanuric renal failure, hepatocellular dysfunction, signs of septic encephalopathy and severe refractory metabolic acidosis” after being transferred to the ICU of the Costa del Sol Hospital, leading to multiple organ failure and her eventual death on April 28, 2015.
The Superior Court of Justice of Andalucia ruled that the woman had died due to medical malpractice and more specifically the failure to assess correctly the severity of the woman’s condition on April 19, 2015 and once again on April 24, 2015, which it was argued allowed the woman to contract the sepsis which led to her death.
The woman’s family will be compensated 185,457 euros by the Ministry of Health as instructed by theSuperior Court of Justice of Andalucia.