High Blood Pressure Management To Blame For Stroke
In 2002, plaintiff Charles Carnes, 69, retired, suffered a stroke following prostate surgery. For the past nine years, he was a patient of Dr. John Caruso for high blood pressure.Caruso was called in to manage his medical condition while he was in the hospital. In the four days following the surgery, Caruso failed to act as Carnes’ blood pressure steadily increased, from 190/110 on Wednesday to 230/110 the following morning. In spite of this, Caruso only administered one dose of medication, which was a insufficient dose for the problem. Caruso did not come to see Carnes, but phoned in the prescription and allowed him to be discharged from the hospital without having his blood pressure checked. Carnes was discharged Friday, and was okay for the remainder of the day. On Saturday, he begins feeling pain in his body and by that night he suffered a stroke that paralyzed the left side of his body.
Carnes sued Caruso for medical malpractice, claiming that he failed to control Carne’s blood pressure over the course of nine years by not administering the proper medications. This led to an advanced accelerated hardening of the arteries, which did not allow them to constrict allowing a thrombosis. If you have this disease, the ability to constrict and dilate is less effective, and allowed for a occlusive stroke to occur as a result of hypertension.
Defense counsel argued that the medication Caruso administered to Carnes over the nine years was sufficient and that his pressures were not unordinary.
Caruso’s attorneys initially argued that additional blood pressure medicine was not given to Carnes because Caruso feared it might react with the anesthesia or pain medications, but dropped this argument when it was discovered to be unfounded.