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Hover over the highlighted people to hear their stories First-person accounts from ProPublica’s Patient Harm Facebook Community

I didn’t need my surgery nor did I consent to it. Now I’m disabled. Robin Karr

It was not just the improper surgery injury, but their denial of the injury no matter how obvious. Garrick Sitongia

I was supposed to return to work the next day. It’s now been more than seven years and I’ll NEVER be able to return to working. Janiece Staton

I was released crippled… 16 pounds lighter and told a bad infection did this. Michelin Anderson

Bottom line: the nurses didn’t have time to sit and feed my father. Vicki Del Valle Schneider

My daughter meant nothing… All she needed was an antibiotic. Michelle Massey

Dad died 11 weeks after his infection was diagnosed. He was about 50 lbs lighter and he never walked again after his infection. Kathy Day

Click to explore how states track medical harm Information current as of 2012

Click to read one woman’s ordeal

Judy’s Story

Judy Gaines hoped a knee replacement would make her life better. Instead, it has tortured her.

After her July 2010 surgery, an infection set in and ran roughshod. Bacteria consumed bones and flesh in her leg until doctors had to remove her new artificial knee. They inserted antibiotic chips in the space where the knee should have been. For almost four months, a microbial battle waged in her leg.

In that time, Gaines had no knee. She sat in a wheelchair, her left leg locked in a brace to keep the empty socket from folding in on itself. Her sister and best friend, Claire, helped care for her.

Gaines couldn’t bend her leg to get in a car, so she needed an ambulance for doctor visits. Wheeling about home required wide berth – to avoid jarring the leg on a cabinet or chair, causing blinding pain.

Once when Gaines was alone, she fell out of the wheelchair. She had to call emergency workers for help.

Infections acquired at the hospital are one of the most common problems with knee replacements. Gaines realized she had one just days after she returned home. Doctors did emergency surgery to try and scrape the infection out. Months of physical therapy followed, but the infection persisted, eating away at the bone in her lower leg until it fractured in February 2011.

Gaines spent the next five months in a wheelchair. She gamely spent more weeks in physical therapy – and was able to walk again – until the artificial knee became unstable, again from the infection, her medical records show. She couldn’t take a step without excruciating pain.

It took many more months to find a surgeon with the skills to fix the problem. One doctor looked and said he would have to amputate, the sisters say. They did not go back.

In May 2012, Gaines went to a new facility, the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City. Doctors there said they could save her leg and that she would be able to walk again. That August, they removed the original knee replacement, and in November, put in a new knee and graft to replace lost bone.

Gaines went home from rehab in January, only to suffer an accident in which she fell and hit her head, requiring another surgery. She is in therapy and learning to walk again, but is expected to fully recover.

Among the lessons Gaines says she learned is that there’s no such thing as a routine surgery. “Any operation is dangerous,” she says. “It’s an assault to your body no matter how you look at it.”

— Marshall Allen

Click for one patient’s story

Case Study: Preventable Complications, a Hospital’s Response

In July 2011, Sharon Van Putten was admitted to a Virginia hospital with leg weakness, back pain and what would eventually be diagnosed as lung cancer. While there, she developed a pressure sore—something experts say should never happen in a hospital—that tore away flesh as deep as her tailbone.

Scroll through to experience the final months of her life told through medical records and an investigator’s findings, then click to see the hospital’s response.

Taken from the findings of a review by VHQC, a Medicare Quality Improvement Organization, a not-for-profit group contracted by Medicare to investigate cases of patient harm.

Read

July 1, 2011

Van Putten is admitted with leg weakness and back pain.

July 2, 2011

Van Putten has spinal surgery. Records show skin on Van Putten’s lower back shows signs of breaking down. It’s red and warm to the touch.

July 8, 2011

Van Putten’s shows a 5 cm × 4 cm bedsore, red with small blisters.

Investigator: Patient was at “high risk” for pressure ulcers (bedsore), but they “should not occur in a hospital setting if proper precautions and care are rendered.”

July 19, 2011

Van Putten’s sore is 6 cm × 3 cm and contains dead tissue. Records show the wound may not have been accurately measured.

Investigator: Proper assessment “would have provided nurses and doctors with a tool to easily evaluate and monitor the healing” of the wounds.

August 29, 2011

Having been previously released, Van Putten returns to the hospital with various symptoms. The pressure sore is smaller, but still present.

September 20–26, 2011

Van Putten’s wound doubles in size since her readmission. It’s now 6 cm long.

Investigator: “…wound assessment was not clearly documented by the certified wound nurse.”

Investigator: “This likely could have been a preventable complication.”

November 8, 2011

After being admitted to a different hospital, lab results show the pressure sore has become infected with an antibiotic resistant bacteria. Van Putten develops a bloodstream infection.

November 11, 2011

Van Putten dies of lung cancer. An autopsy says infection from the bedsore was a contributing factor.

Investigator: “…the services received did not meet all applicable professionally recognized standards of healthcare.”

All care and tests provided to Mrs. Van Putten were in accordance with the professional judgment of the clinicians involved and Inova believes such care was appropriate.

Inova Fairfax Medical Campus CEO Patrick Christiansen in response to the quality expert’s findings.

Click to see if you’ve got a case

Test Case

In theory, the courts are a place where people who’ve suffered harm can seek compensation. But it’s harder than you might think.

Some patients suffer injuries that are not clearly negligent; others can’t prove economic losses high enough to make it worthwhile for an attorney to take their case, according to a recent Emory University study.

How does it play out? Create a test case by answering the questions, then see the result.

What happened to you?

Infection Medication error Surgical error

What is your identity?

Low Income Elderly Non-white Wealthy white

How severe was the injury?

Emotional distress Minor injury Permanent injury Death

Some states have passed laws that limit the amount of money patients can receive in malpractice cases. Do you live in one of these states?

Yes No

Case denied.

Try again

Looks like you’ve found an attorney to take your case. You’re the one out of fifty with the right kind of error, the right demographic (upper-class white male), the right degree of harm, and living in the right state.

Try again

Click to see the numbers behind patient harm