William D. Kickham
William D. Kickham
Construction Accident
Car Accident
Nursing Home

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There was a recent case settlement involving Massachusetts nursing home neglect and abuse, which should serve as a cautionary warning to anyone who has a loved one living in a nursing home anywhere. It isn’t a pretty story.

A woman was admitted to a Massachusetts nursing home in August of 2004. Two months later, she was found in bed with a spiral fracture of the left tibia and a fracture of the left fibula. Since she was found in her own bed, how this injury could have happened was a mystery, to say the least. An inquiry determined the already obvious conclusion that the patient could not have produced these injuries herself. Despite the inquiry, no definitive alternate explanation could be produced. File that under “Stinks to the high heavens, but we can’t prove who did it.”

The fractures required hospitalization and casting of the woman’s leg. When she was returned to the nursing home, she very predictably became immobilized due to her leg being in a cast. As a result of this immobility, she developed a pressure ulcer on her lower back, and also very predictably, a urinary tract infection. She also suffered from dehydration. If the average person knew how common and predictable this downward series of events is in a nursing home environment, they’d become quite upset. It’s how 95% of nursing home patients eventually die. It’s awful – both to see and to describe. I can only shudder to think of what it would be like to actually suffer through this kind of experience. I can’t imagine that most people would not prefer death long before that happens.

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Whenever I’m in my car, and I see bicyclists on the road, I shudder. They invariably share the roadway with we drivers, and it’s always scary to pass them, because you never know when they might lose control of their bike and suffer a serious personal injury. Cyclists just seem so vulnerable out there, in the middle of the street.

This is exactly what happened this past week on the Bourne Bridge, where everyone should practice the utmost safety, both drivers and cyclists alike. Early Monday morning, a 56-year-old man was riding his bike on the bridge, when apparently, at the crown of the bridge, wind gusts are thought to have forced him to lose control of his bicycle. He fell into the path of a tractor trailer coming from the opposite direction, and was hit by the truck. Lucky for him, he did not die, because the majority of truck-bike accidents produce often fatal injuries. The cyclist did, however, suffer a serious injury from the Massachusetts bicycle-truck accident.

As a Boston motor vehicle accident attorney, I urge all cyclists and all drivers to always proceed with caution, lest you suffer an extremely serious injury. Cyclists should always wear bright, reflective clothing. At night, easily visible lights and flashers should be both on the bike and the rider.

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One thing I can’t stand these days, is the growing proliferation of pharmaceutical advertising. Whether on TV, radio, or in print, it seems one can’t go anywhere or listen to anything without being bombarded by some usually laughable or ridiculous ad, (not uncommonly depicted with cartoon-like drawings,) pushing the latest offering by some pharmaceutical company. And with each and every one, comes the push “Ask your doctor about ___________.” Worse, recently, pharmaceutical companies have adopted the “Coupon Approach”: “Yes, you, too, can get a FREE sample of _________ if you present this coupon to your doctor!”

Years ago, it used to be that the pharmaceutical industry marketed their prescription drug products solely to the dispensing/prescribing end of the sales process: Doctors. That all ended about 15 or so years ago. The drug companies finally got wise to the gullibility of the average American, and saw the light: “Hey, instead of just hawking our products to doctors, who may or may not end up prescribing them to their patients, why don’t we just create demand at the patient level by marketing prescription drugs directly to consumers?” So now, taking advantage of the dumbing down of America, you can watch commercials depicting walking stick figures made of plumbing pipes for bladder control, amorous couples exchanging “that” look for Viagra tablets, and wind-up dolls for depression. In each and every one of these commercials and print ads, is buried some nonchalant “warnings” about “possible side effects,” that are communicated with an insouciant whisper of (“But this would never happen to you“).

Amidst the stampede of this new marketing world for the drug companies, has come a lot of results that should have been expected: Serious prescription drug injuries, including death. One drug in particular took the prize for being the most litigated for prescription drug product liability: Reglan. Reglan is a drug made by Schwarz Pharma and is generically known as metoclopramide. It is used to relieve symptoms caused by slow stomach emptying in people who have diabetes — (and, of course, the number of people who have diabetes has exploded in recent years, due to the nauseating obesity epidemic in this country, but that’s another subject.) The drug was first approved for use in the U.S. in 1985 and comes in the form of injections, tablets, and syrup. Class action lawsuits against the manufacturers of Reglan have been brought due to the very serious side effects caused by the medication, many of them fatal. These side effects have included agranulocytosis, which causes low levels of white blood cells, which can be fatal if left untreated. Aldosteronism is a condition causing excessive production of hormones and low blood potassium levels. Other side effects of Reglan include depression, suicidal thoughts, hallucinations, seizures, jaundice, severe allergic reactions, tachycardia, and tardive dyskinesia. Reglan can also result in NMS, or neuroleptic malignant syndrome, which causes muscle rigidity, fever, and delirium. Like so many other Reglan side effects, this can be life threatening.

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Here’s yet another example of how a product snuck through the system, and has caused so much damage in women that there now exist hundreds of medical product liability lawsuits aimed at its manufacturer.

Surgical mesh has been used in surgery for awhile. So when a new type of plastic mesh needed to be approved by the Food and Drug Administration, it apparently got fast-track approval, without the tests that the FDA typically requires for first-of-its-kind devices. The upshot? Johnson & Johnson, the manufacturer of the plastic surgical mesh, now plans to stop selling its surgical mesh implants that are used to treat women, because the mesh implants have been linked not only to injuries, but hundreds of lawsuits. So, this past Monday, J&J said that it plans to phase out four mesh products over the course of the next three to nine months.

The plastic mesh implants were used to strengthen a woman’s pelvic wall in cases of pelvic organ prolapse – a condition that happens when the bladder or other reproductive organs slip down into the vagina. Last year, it is estimated that about 75,000 women had received the mesh implants, although there is another type of surgery that can correct this problem, using a simple incision in the abdomen. Last year the FDA reported that these mesh implants were associated with higher rates of pain, bleeding, and infection than the traditional surgery that simply used stitches. One Miami woman, Lana Keeton, who had the plastic mesh implanted back in 2001, has undergone 17 – that’s correct – 17 surgeries to remove the implanted mesh. She even founded a group called Truth in Medicine, which has lobbied the FDA about the harmfulness of mesh. She has described the synthetic mesh as resembling “the cut edges of a window screen,” to show how harmful and sharp the mesh is, and to demonstrate how painful it makes sexual intercourse.

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File this under “You Should Always Get A Second Medical Opinion.” Because you never know when a medical doctor is going to give you the wrong information, and the next thing you know, you suffer serious injuries as a result. Sometimes, that “bad medical advice” can lead to death.

Such was the case in 2006, when Eric Dupre, 33 years old, of Fall River experienced chest pains, prompting him to visit a walk-in medical clinic in Somerset. The clinic’s doctor performed an EKG on him, which showed nothing abnormal. He was told to go home and rest. And he died 12 hours later.

His widow Michelle, and their two children, Riley and Zachary, filed a lawsuit alleging that Mr. Dupre’s death was the result of medical negligence by Prima Care, as well as that of the doctor, Dr. James Stubbert, and his physician’s assistant, Amber Mello. Just this week the case settled for $2.5 Million. As part of the settlement, all parties involved promised to not comment on the incident.

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As a Boston-Dedham personal injury attorney, I’ve handled a great deal of personal injuries due to many forces, including cases of food poisoning. In fact, most people would be surprised to learn of the number of injuries that can result from improperly or negligently prepared food. In this case, the alleged culprit was somethign we all love: A chocolate chip cookie.

The plaintiff in this case alleged that she sustained injuries to her mouth and teeth from a hard object when she bit into a chocolate chip cookie while visiting her mother at an assisted living facility, called Sunrise. Importantly in this case, the cookie had been given free to the plaintiff by the facility. She did not purchase it. Not a big deal, you say? It is a big deal in the eyes of the law, especially when dealing with Massachusetts negligence claims.

That’s because whehter or not the defendant facility (Sunrise) could have been found liable for the plaintiff’s injuries here, would depend upon whether or not the facility could be shown to have breached something in Massachusetts law called the “Warranty of Merchantability.” This is an implied warranty (which means it doesn’t need to be stated in writing,) dealing with Massachusetts consumer law. Boiling it down to a brief explanation, it states that a particular product that a merchant sells, must be suitable and safe for the purpose it was produced. The legal question in this case? Did the assisted living facility, in providing this free food item to the plaintiff, qualify legally as a “merchant”?

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Maybe it was the “curiosity factor,” but people still aren’t sure what happened in the string of car crashes that occurred on Sunday in Attleboro. Massachusetts State Police are investigating the incidents.

The first Attleboro car crash occurred around 9AM on Sunday near Route One, and involved two cars. They wound up in the woods along the highway, and one even caught on fire. Right afterward, another two-car accident in Attleboro happened in the same spot. Then, less than an hour later, another serious Attleboro car accident took place there, in which three people were taken to the hospital.

At this moment, no one knows what caused all of these Massachusetts automobile accident injuries. However, as a Boston-Dedham personal injury attorney, I know that when Massachusetts car crash injuries are caused by a motor vehicle operator’s negligence, you deserve to be compensated for the physical pain and suffering, emotional trauma, and economic harm they inflict on you. Even in moderate motor vehicle accident cases, I have represented Boston motor vehicle accident victims whose lives will never be the same.

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Given the fact that many people belong to health clubs these days, I’m often approached by people about their Massachusetts health club contracts. You see, (if you belong to a gym or health club,) you’ll learn that the standard contract terms that are used for these types of agreements by almost all Massachusetts gyms and health clubs, prevent you as the customer from suing the health club for any injuries suffered on the premises.

These health club injuries can arise from any number of circumstances: A weight dropped on someone, a cable or pulley on a machine that lets go, a slip and fall on a floor or pool area, even swimming pool injuries. You signed the agreement, and now you find that you’ve been injured in some way that you feel is attributable to negligence of the part of the health club. So you’re out of luck, right?

No, you’re not. While 99.9% of businesses try to escape liability by incorporating liability disclaimers like this, not all of them are effective or valid. When it comes to health club memberships in Massachusetts, attempted “Releases of Liability” like these are barred by state statute. Specifically, Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 93, Section 80, which states in relevant part: “No contract for health club services may contain any provisions whereby the buyer agrees not to assert against the seller or any assignee or transferee of the health club services contract any claim or defense arising out of the health club services contract or the buyer’s activities at the health club.”

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It’s the word we all never want to hear: cancer.

That was the very word that Mary White heard on Friday afternoon in May 2007. Her gynecologist called her to say that the polyp that she had had removed a week prior was actually “an aggressive uterine cancer.” The gynecologist told her she needed additional surgery urgently. to remove the cancer. Not surprisingly, she panicked at this information and had her uterus removed. Not too long after the surgery, however, she received another unexpected phone call. This time, her gynecologist informer her that in fact, she did not have cancer at all, and never did have cancer. The surgery removing her uterus, and rendering her sterile for life, was needless.

You don’t have to be a Boston medical malpractice attorney, as I am, to understand the tumultuous and devastating emotions that Ms. White suffered due to those two phone calls. Anyone would sympathize and empathize with her circumstances.

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As a Dedham-Boston car accident attorney, I’ve heard more than one story about a Massachusetts car accident that caused a fatality. And now, there’s yet another Massachusetts car crash that took the life of a young student who had just graduated from Yale University, in the class of 2012.

Marina Keegan was killed last week in a Cape Cod car accident that occurred on Route 6 in Dennis. She and her boyfriend, Michael Gocksch, also a member of the Yale class of 2012, were headed to Wellfleet, to the Keegans’ summer home, for a birthday party for her father. Apparently, Mr. Gocksch fell asleep at the wheel, and the car veered off the road, into guardrails on both sides of Route 6, and then flipped over. Mr. Gocksch was hospitalized, in stable condition, and was later discharged. State Police said that speed wasn’t a factor.

Apparently, the news of Ms. Keegan’s death went viral, as she wrote a newspaper column for the Yale Daily News. In her last column, she wrote, “What we have to remember is that we can still do anything.” The column drew a huge outpouring of grief and sympathy for the young graduate. Her ashes were to be strewn in Cape Cod Bay.

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