Hillel Yaffe Hospital will compensate a woman giving birth with 266,000 shekels - due to unnecessary surgery

March 21, 2021   

The Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court ruled that a woman who gave birth by unnecessary cesarean section will be compensated by the state-run Hillel Yaffe Hospital for more than 266,000 shekels, including legal costs and attorney fees. Looking for an idea for a fish dish for the holiday? Get dozens of recipes for fish dishes You don't have to be a volunteer at an emergency organization to save lives. You can too. ‘'Against experimental vaccine, coronavirus': How many people has the anti-vaccine pike killed? The woman was represented in the legal proceedings by Attorneys Gal Markovich and David Pyle of Pyle & Co. The lawsuit filed by the woman alleged that about six years ago, when she was 35 weeks pregnant, she had an ultrasound examination at a health insurance company. According to her, during the examination, the doctor told her that the fetus was in a breech presentation, and therefore she had two options: one - to undergo a procedure to turn the fetus over while it was still in the womb, and the other - a cesarean section. The doctor explained to her the risks involved in the procedure to turn the fetus over, and since things were as they were, the woman chose the second option - a cesarean section. In another ultrasound examination, which was performed about a week later, this time at Hillel Yaffe Hospital, the woman was again told that the fetus was in a breech presentation, and at that time she was scheduled for a cesarean section about 10 days later, while it was explained to her that the only reason for performing it was the fetus's presentation. However, three days before the due date, The woman went to the emergency room in Hallel Yaffe. According to the ruling, upon admission to the hospital she was told that there was no doctor in the maternity ward and that she was not given an ultrasound - a test that is routinely performed before childbirth. About an hour and a half later, she was transferred to the maternity ward, where she was examined by a doctor who, according to the woman's version accepted by the court, appeared tired and confused. According to the documentation, the doctor's examination took about a minute and he did not perform an ultrasound on the woman either. On the admission sheet to the maternity ward, after the doctor's examination, it was recorded that the fetus was in a cephalic presentation. Despite this, at the doctor's direction, the woman was transferred to the delivery room to perform a cesarean section with an indication for a breech presentation. The cesarean section was performed by the same doctor and the summary report of the surgery recorded: "Recovery of a baby in a cephalic presentation without difficulty." This was also recorded in the hospitalization summary. In other words, according to lawyers Markowitz and Pyle, there was actually no need to perform the surgery at all. According to them, the woman's recovery from the surgery was difficult, she had to receive numerous blood transfusions and experienced difficulties connecting with the baby and breastfeeding. It is important to note that during this birth, the mother was unaware that she had undergone an unnecessary cesarean section. She only learned this infuriating fact during the follow-up of her second pregnancy, when she was exposed to the cesarean section records, which explicitly stated that the baby was delivered in a cephalic presentation. According to her, the hospital was negligent in not performing a simple ultrasound examination, an examination that could have prevented the cesarean section, thus sparing her much suffering. The state's attorneys, who represented the Hillel Yaffe Hospital, argued, on the other hand, that the mother had undergone an ultrasound examination, and that the words "cephalic presentation" that appear in the emergency department report were either a clerical error or a misdiagnosis during the manual examination. As for the words "head presentation," which were also repeated in the surgical procedure report, the hospital claimed that this was an error caused by the introduction of a new reporting system, which has since been discontinued. The claim was supported by the opinion of Dr. Ilan Halevi, who, after reviewing the medical records, showed that the woman was connected to the monitor throughout her stay in the emergency room and throughout her stay in the maternity ward until she was transferred to the delivery room. Dr. Halevi explained that it is not possible to perform an ultrasound examination along with monitoring, and hence that she was not given an ultrasound examination. Thus, the expert testified: "At no stage is there any interruption in the performance of the monitor, there is no situation in which the monitor strap is removed and there is a break in the monitor in order to perform the ultrasound. This is conclusive proof that an ultrasound examination was not performed at any stage." Judge Dr. Menachem (Mario) Klein was not convinced by the versions given by the hospital and questioned their reliability. As for the testimony of the doctor, who examined the woman prior to the birth, the judge ruled that it was unreliable. On the other hand, the judge ruled that the testimonies of the woman and her husband were reliable and coherent, both regarding the sequence of events and the failure to perform the ultrasound tests. "The defendant could have foreseen or should have foreseen the occurrence of the damage in the specific circumstances of the case, namely the unnecessary performance of a cesarean section." In his ruling, the judge criticized the conduct of the Hillel Yaffe Hospital, as revealed by the documents, in which the fetal presentation was carelessly deleted in handwriting without a signature and time, "contrary to hospital regulations that require deletion in a 'line'." As for the hospital's claim that the woman expressed her consent to the cesarean section, the judge ruled: "There is no doubt that the plaintiff's consent to the operation stemmed from the thought that the baby was in a breech presentation, whereas she knew that "The baby was in a cephalic presentation and that a normal birth could be performed, she would have preferred that." The judge accepted the woman's claims, through attorney Pyle, and ruled that the hospital must pay her compensation in the amount of 180,000 shekels for pain, suffering and loss of autonomy, as well as an additional 25,000 shekels for extraordinary expenses incurred by her. The judge ordered the hospital to pay court costs and attorney's fees.