Washington v. Washington Hospital Center Case Brief Summary | Law Case Explained

Washington v. Washington Hospital Center | 579 A.2d 177 (1990)

When a healthy young woman died during elective surgery, her mother went after the hospital in Washington versus Washington Hospital Center.

Laverne Alice Thompson was thirty-six years old and healthy. She went to Washington Hospital Center for an abortion and tubal ligation, a procedure that required general anesthesia. Nurse-anesthetist Elizabeth Adland inserted an endotracheal tube that was meant to carry oxygen into Thompson’s lungs and carbon dioxide out of them while Thompson was anesthetized. The tube should’ve gone into Thompson’s trachea, but Adland accidentally placed it in her esophagus. Doctor Sheryl Walker, the supervising anesthesiologist, observed Thompon’s physical reactions and concluded that she’d been properly intubated.

The surgeon, Nathon Bobrow, began the surgery. He quickly noted that Thompson’s blood was unusually dark, which indicated that her blood wasn’t receiving enough oxygen. Adland checked her vital signs and found them stable, and Bobrow continued. Thompson’s heart rate dropped. She suffered a cardiac arrest. She was resuscitated, but her brain had been deprived of oxygen, and Thompson ended up in a permanent vegetative state.

Thompson’s mother, Alma Washington, sued the hospital for medical malpractice. Washington alleged that the hospital had negligently failed to supply the doctors with a carbon-dioxide monitor that could’ve detected the insufficient oxygen in time to prevent Thompson’s brain injury. Washington’s expert testified that the American Association of Anesthesiology encouraged the use of carbon-dioxide monitors and that an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association had stated that monitoring carbon dioxide was an emerging standard and strongly preferred.

The jury returned a verdict of four point six million dollars. The hospital appealed to the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. It argued that because carbon-dioxide monitors weren’t mandatory, their use couldn’t be considered the standard of care.

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