The Supreme Court of Virginia has ordered a new trial for the estate of a woman who died from a pulmonary embolism after information about her life threatening condition was not acted upon by her physicians.

In May 2005 Tawanda Williams was referred to a local radiologist for a sonogram of her calf after she reported calf pain to her doctors at Kaiser Permanente. The radiologist, Vienna physician Cong Le, interpreted the study and concluded that Williams suffered from deep vein thrombosis, a potentially life-threatening condition involving blood clots in her leg. While dangerous, deep vein thrombosis is very amenable to treatment.

According the Supreme Court’s opinion, released June 6, 2008, Le reached an operator at Kaiser and, after identifying himself and asking to speak to Dr. McClain, he was put on hold so long that he “lost confidence to get in touch with [Dr. McClain] at that moment.” He stated that he was unable to leave a voicemail or talk to a human being. Dr. Le testified that previously he had problems communicating with the doctors at Kaiser by telephone. Dr. Le hung up and faxed a report to Dr. McClain.

The information that Tawanda Williams had life threatening blood clots was not acted upon by her doctor and she died six days later.

The Virginia Supreme Court said that “the evidence proved without contradiction that the communication problems in this case were begun and put in motion by Dr. Le’s failure to make direct contact with Dr. McClain, a member of his team, or Williams.” Reversing the trial court’s decision to allow the jury to determine that Dr. Le’s negligence was “cut-off” by Dr. McClain’s failure to read the report that had been faxed to him, the Supreme Court ordered a new trial.

Benjamin W. Glass, III, one of the attorneys who represented the estate said that this case “presents a patient’s worst nightmare—a test is done which shows a condition that is life-threatening but very treatable—but none of the doctors act on the request. Dr. Le should have called back and told the Kaiser operator that he had an emergency on his hands and he should also have called Tawanda Williams and told her to get to an emergency department. He had a time-bomb on his hands yet he failed to communicate the urgency of the situation to the Kaiser operator.”

Glass and his co-counsel, Frank Kearney of Washington, D.C. expect that a new trial will be held in the Spring of 2009. The Supreme Court's opinion is here.

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