Scott Perlmuter and Katie Harris obtained a $800,000 jury verdict for the death of a nursing home resident who was prescribed morphine for his chronic pain despite having advanced kidney disease. Since the kidneys filter out and pass toxins from medications like morphine, our client’s kidney disease caused the morphine to build up; after a few days of receiving morphine he was found overmedicated and unresponsive. By the time that Narcan was administered, it was too late. He suffered a cascade of medical complications culminating in his death 17 days later.
The doctor denied that prescribing the morphine was improper, and denied that our client’s death had anything to do with his having received morphine. He defended the case by pointing to all of our client’s chronic medical issues and the fact that our client had been referred to hospice two years before the incidents at issue at trial. The doctor refused to participate in any settlement negotiation even up through the time that the jury returned with the judgment against him.