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submitted 11 months ago by girlfreddy@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

When Shawn Murphy’s wife died in 2009 after a botched gallbladder surgery, he presumed the doctor who performed the operation would be forced out of medicine for good.

Dr. Pachavit Kasemsap, a former Air Force surgeon, had cut Loretta Murphy’s aorta during that common procedure, according to a database of malpractice payments kept by Florida insurance regulators. She never left the hospital and died just shy of her 40th birthday. Shawn Murphy was left to raise their two daughters, then 13 and 17, on his own.

During the weeks that Murphy prayed for his wife to recover and the months that he fought Kasemsap in circuit court in Brevard County, Florida, he didn’t know that other families had complained that their loved ones had suffered under the same doctor’s care.

Kasemsap has settled five malpractice cases for a total of $3 million, according to the Florida malpractice payment database. That includes $1 million paid to the Murphy family. In one of the cases Kasemsap settled, a patient said the doctor negligently stapled and stitched her rectum to her vagina. Kasemsap denied doing that, and in legal filings in all five cases, the doctor denied that he was negligent.

The doctor’s LinkedIn profile says his last job as a surgeon ended in December 2012, months before he settled the last of those five cases. But there was one industry ready to welcome him regardless: health insurance.

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[-] Moobythegoldensock@lemm.ee 7 points 11 months ago

Not surprising. How many talented doctors do you think go into medicine to do insurance reviews?

[-] JustZ@lemmy.world 2 points 11 months ago

Well, if you're a whore and the insurance company knows it can count on you to say whatever is going to get it off the hook, it can pay better than surgery.

[-] Spacehooks@reddthat.com 6 points 11 months ago

In one of the cases Kasemsap settled, a patient said the doctor negligently stapled and stitched her rectum to her vagina

Bro wtf you on that could have let this happen?

[-] Zorque@kbin.social 4 points 11 months ago

Reminds me of the doctor on Scrubs that screwed up so much they sent him to the morgue for pathology.

[-] JustZ@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

He was a good doctor, just panicked under pressure.

[-] StorminNorman@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

No, he was a good pathologist in that he knew the cause of most diseases. He was a terrible doctor cos he couldn't apply that knowledge to save his patients, ultimately ending with them dying.

this post was submitted on 15 Dec 2023
86 points (97.8% liked)

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