Whitley jury awards man $1.2 million in malpractice case

A Whitley County Circuit Court Jury has awarded over $1.25 million to a Knox County man who claimed a group of local doctors failed to adequately treat him during numerous visits in 2000.
The jury’s verdict, handed down Aug. 12, placed almost all the blame on the Corbin Family Health Center, Paul Cooney and Glenn Uber (both doctors of osteopathy), and Stephen Toadvine, a doctor of medicine. All three worked at the health center.
According to the original lawsuit, filed in Aug. 2001, Darel Warfield visited doctors at the clinic numerous times in Nov. 2001. The complaint claims Toadvine, Cooney and Uber failed to diagnose or treat him for “ischemic attacks,” commonly referred to as mini-strokes. The attacks usually involve temporary weakness, blurred vision or confusion. They are often the warning signs of a more serious impending stroke.
Warfield later did have a “massive and debilitating stroke,” according to the lawsuit.
In a finding of fault, the jury said Cooney, Toadvine and Warfield himself were each 10 percent at fault in the case. Uber was assigned 20 percent of the blame and the Corbin Family Health Center was 50 percent at fault. The percentages are important because they determine how much of the final judgment each party could be responsible for.
Warfield was suing for past and future medical expenses, lost past and future wages and pain and suffering. His wife was also a plaintiff in the suit.
The jury awarded $82,844.60 for medical expenses, $223,708 for past lost wages, $400,000 for future earnings, $500,000 for pain and suffering and $50,000 for his wife’s “loss of consortium” – a term used to describe companionship lost because of the stroke.