Lawsuit: Hospital failed to recognize signs of neurological condition

A Connecticut man has filed a lawsuit against the University of Maryland Baltimore Washington Medical Center, alleging the hospital failed to recognize his severe back pain, numbness and tingling as signs of a serious neurological condition and instead sent him home without an MRI scan.

After Sarrese J. Bradley arrived at the medical center’s emergency room, a doctor examined him but did not attempt to determine whether his symptoms were associated with spinal cord or nerve root compression, according to the lawsuit filed last week in U.S. District Court in Baltimore.

As a result, Bradley alleges he did not receive a diagnosis of spinal degeneration and disc herniation with cauda equina syndrome — extreme pressure and swelling of the nerves at the end of the spinal cord that can lead to paralysis, impaired bladder function and difficulty walking if emergency surgery is delayed — until he returned to the medical center the next day.

Bradley continues to experience pain and instability in both legs more than three years after the incident, the complaint states.

“He still walks with a cane and has great trouble getting around,” said Ryan S. Perlin, who is representing Bradley, along with E. Dale Adkins III. Perlin and Adkins are with Salsbury, Clements, Bekman, Marder & Adkins LLC in Baltimore.

The medical center declined to comment on Tuesday, citing pending litigation and patient privacy laws.

On the morning of June 21, 2012, Bradley, who was in Maryland on an extended work assignment, called for an ambulance after feeling a “pop” in his lower back, the complaint states. He was soon unable to stand due to back pain and injury to his pelvis and was taken to the medical center’s emergency department shortly after 7 a.m.

At the hospital, a nurse reported that Bradley had numbness, weakness and a tingling sensation radiating down both legs to his feet, according to the complaint.

Steven Abert, a doctor who is also named as a defendant in the suit, examined Bradley but did not order imaging studies or test his neurologic response, the lawsuit states. Bradley was discharged from the hospital around 9 a.m.

“He woke up in the morning and he had this excruciating pain, so he goes to the ER and they kind of look him over, and then they send him home,” Perlin said.

‘We need the bed’

When Bradley asked why he was being discharged, “he was told, ‘we need the bed,’” the lawsuit states. He was instructed to get an MRI, but was told that the hospital could not perform one without a primary care physician’s order.

Later that afternoon, Bradley went to Arundel Physicians Associates LLC, now called University of Maryland Baltimore Washington Primary Care, where he received another physical exam but was again not examined specifically for signs of spinal cord compression or other neurological conditions despite his symptoms, according to the complaint.

Bradley was also told the radiology center would not be able to schedule him for an MRI immediately and then instructed to obtain the scan the following day. He returned to his hotel and fell asleep only to wake up before midnight and realize he had lost control of his bladder, according to the complaint.

Bradley then returned to the hospital, where he received an MRI and was diagnosed by a neurosurgeon with spinal degeneration and disc herniation with cauda equina syndrome, the lawsuit states. He was then taken to the operating room for emergency surgery and discharged several days later.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages, alleging the hospital’s negligence in failing to perform a neurological examination or correctly diagnose Bradley the first time he visited the ER led him to suffer painful, permanent injuries.

The case is Sarrese J. Bradley, et al. v. Baltimore Washington Medical Center Inc. et al., 1:15-cv-03266-JKB.