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Rock Hill family settles suit with doctor: Former Piedmont physician to pay $400,000 to woman whose husband died in 2003
(Herald, The (Rock Hill, SC) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Nov. 24--A Rock Hill woman and her family will receive $400,000 after settling a lawsuit that claimed her 56-year-old husband died four years ago after a doctor at Piedmont Medical Center misdiagnosed appendicitis.
The suit, filed in 2005, contends that Willie Belton of Rock Hill did not receive proper medical treatment when he went to PMC on Sept. 6, 2003. The suit was settled earlier this week, much to the relief of Belton's widow, Aaronita.
"I've been fighting this battle for four years," Belton said. "I feel vindicated."
Belton's family sued Tenet Healthcare, parent company of PMC; Amisub of South Carolina, which does business as Piedmont Healthcare System; Dr. Craig Dates; and York Emergency Physicians.
Tenet Healthcare and Amisub were dismissed from the suit. Dates and York Emergency Physicians settled this week.
Dates, who formerly practiced emergency medicine with York Emergency Physicians, could not be reached for comment. However, Greenville attorney Steven Synder said Dates provided the appropriate care.
"The settlement was a compromise, and no liability was admitted at any time," Synder said. "There was a disagreement about what should have been done."
Dates now practices emergency medicine in the Atlanta area, Synder said.
On Sept. 5, 2003, Willie Belton had a cardiac catheterization, according to the suit and Aaronita Belton's attorney, Chad McGowan.
"The next morning, he went back to the emergency room with severe abdominal pains and vomiting," McGowan said. "They diagnosed him with abdominal pains of unknown origin."
Synder said blood tests were performed on Willie Belton. But the the suit notes: "Dates never ordered an abdominal CT, nor any other imaging to rule out potentially serious and or life-threatening causes of Mr. Belton's signs and symptoms."
Belton's pains continued over the weekend, prompting a trip to his family doctor, who ordered an emergency CAT scan on Sept. 8, McGowan said.
"A ruptured appendix was discovered," he said. "He had surgery later that day, but it was too late because the infection had already spread."
He died 44 days after the surgery in intensive care, the suits notes. He "suffered and died from a completely treatable condition," according to the suit.
To see more of The Herald, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.heraldonline.com.
Copyright (c) 2007, The Herald, Rock Hill, S.C.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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