The United Kingdom-based Privy Council has begun to hear submissions in the final appeal of a private hospital and a specialist doctor over being ordered to pay over $18 million in compensation for their alleged roles in the death of the husband of former finance minister Karen Nunez-Tesheira.
Lawyers representing Gulf View Medical Centre Ltd and anaesthesiologist Dr Crisen Jendra Roopchand presented their submissions during a hearing before Lords Reed, Sales, Hamblen, Stephens and Pentland yesterday morning.
Insurance executive Russell Tesheira died at age 54, after undergoing a transurethral resectioning of the prostate operation at the institution on April 13, 2004.
During the procedure, an instrument is inserted up the patient’s urethra to remove the section of the prostate that is blocking urine flow.
Two hours after the procedure, Tesheira was found to be bleeding excessively, prompting doctors to perform a secondary operation and emergency blood transfusions. Tesheira died on the operating table.
Nunez-Tesheira filed the lawsuit claiming the hospital and the two doctors who did the procedure—anaesthesiologist Dr Crisen Jendra Roopchand and urologist Dr Lester Goetz — were negligent in her husband’s death.
In 2011, former High Court Judge and current Appellate Judge Vasheist Kokaram dismissed the medical negligence lawsuit at a preliminary stage after Nunez-Tesheira failed to meet two successive deadlines he set for filing her evidence against the three parties.
While appealing the decision, Nunez-Tesheira came to an agreement with Dr Goetz which saw him being removed from the lawsuit without accepting liability.
Nunez-Tesheira eventually won in the Court of Appeal and the lawsuit was reinstated.
In March 2015, Justice Kokaram ruled in Nunez-Tesheira’s favour.
Kokaram said the hospital failed to monitor and contain Tesheira’s post-surgical bleeding and maintain an appropriate supply of blood and clotting agents, as he was transfused with O+ blood instead of the A+ he required.
He also ruled that Roopchand was negligent in not taking steps in controlling Tesheira’s bleeding and checking if he was on an aspirin regime before the operation was performed.
In assessing compensation for Tesheira’s family, Kokaram considered the salary and benefits he would have accrued if he had continued to work at Clico, where his last annual bonus before his death was almost $4 million.
Justice Kokaram’s decision was eventually upheld by the Court of Appeal, which did so despite finding inconsistencies.
The hospital and Dr Roopchand then filed a separate lawsuit seeking to have Dr Goetz pay a percentage of the compensation they were ordered to pay.
Their case was eventually rejected by a High Court Judge and the Court of Appeal, which both questioned the timing of the move.
Presenting submissions yesterday, lawyers for the hospital and Dr Roopchand maintained that the local courts decided the case wrongly.
They claimed that Dr Goetz should have borne the brunt of the responsibility, as Tesheira was his patient and he (Goetz) merely utilised the hospital’s facilities and nursing staff to perform the procedure.
The hospital’s lawyers sought to refer to receipts for the procedure, which they claimed showed that the parties were paid separately. However, they admitted that the contractual relationship was not raised in the local courts.
Dr Roopchand’s lawyer Katherine Deal, QC, suggested that the case against her client was weak and should not have been upheld, as he was merely a member of the medical team, led by Dr Goetz.
“You have to look at his role and his post on the day and the court did not do so. The anaesthesiologist and surgeon have different interests,” Deal said.
The hospital is being represented by Mary O’Rourke, QC, David Boyle, and Joseph Price, while Douglas Mendes, SC, is representing Nunez-Tesheira.
The appeal is scheduled to be completed today.
