The Incident A 61-year-old woman with lung and heart problems went to University of Chicago Medical Center in 2014 for her increasing shortness of breath. The doctor did a catheter procedure to measure pressures in her heart and caused damage to the access artery in the groin. After an attempt to fix the artery and 3 days of monitoring, she was discharged. The next morning, she began to bleed internally. After attempts to save her at another hospital, she was dead a day later. The Result James Coogan and Caroleann Gallagher presented the case before a jury that found the…

A Powerful Statement of Justice Following a two-week trial in Cook County, Illinois in May, 2019, the jury returned a verdict for $3,000,000. The Plaintiff in the case was an adult woman (with two young boys of her own) who lost her mother in July, 2014. Sarah Crayton was a 61-year-old woman who originated from the South Side of Chicago. She had returned to the area after retiring from a 30+ year career with the Post Office. She planned to be closer to her roots and care for her own elderly mother. Over many years, Sarah had experienced increasing symptoms…

Federal CMS Releases “Special Focus Facility” Candidates The Federal Government provides oversight for Nursing Homes in the United States. Part of this is because federal programs like Medicare and Medicaid provide funding for nursing facilities. In their role overseeing complaints about persistent care problems, the Government compiles statistics and investigates facilities. This had previously led to the development of the “Special Focus Facility” program, where facilities received extra scrutiny based upon persistent problems with resident care. Until recently, the Government only released the names of facilities with the SFF designation. Today, CMS released a full list of 395 facilities nationwide…