A Broward County jury awarded more than $2.4 million to a first-grade teacher who lawyers said was left permanently disabled after doctors left a foot-long sponge in her body.Karlene Chambers, of Pembroke Pines, was scheduled for a routine Cesarean procedure on Sept. 11, 2001, at Memorial Hospital West.

A Broward County jury awarded more than $2.4 million to a first-grade teacher who lawyers said was left permanently disabled after doctors left a foot-long sponge in her body.Karlene Chambers, of Pembroke Pines, was scheduled for a routine Cesarean procedure on Sept. 11, 2001, at Memorial Hospital West. Nearly two weeks after her surgery, Chamber was readmitted to another hospital and placed in intensive care after she had severe abdominal pain.A CAT scan revealed that the surgeon who performed the C-section, Dr. Joseph Becerra of the Pembroke Pines OB/GYN Associates, had left a foot-long surgical sponge in Chambers’ body.

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