Fort Lauderdale lawyers Daniel Harwin and Melissa Gunion of Freedland Harwin Valori landed a $15.2 million arbitration award for the family of a woman who fell into a semiconscious state after giving birth at a Kendall hospital.

The award is one of the largest Florida has seen in 25 years, according to Harwin and Gunion.

On April 2, 2018, 42-year-old Johansi Zumoza Garcia delivered her third child via cesarean section at Kendall Healthcare Group Ltd., known as Kendall Regional Medical Center. The baby was Garcia's first daughter, but celebrations were short-lived.

Garcia was discharged from hospital after a couple of days but returned a week later with severe hypertension, or high blood pressure. Unmanaged, it can cause heart attacks, strokes and other complications. In Garcia's case, it caused an intracerebral hemorrhage, a life-threatening stroke caused by bleeding on the brain.

In January, Garcia's family retained Harwin and Gunion, who contended that hospital staff dropped the ball by failing to test for, diagnose and act on the hypertension in time.

“With any woman, it is well-known and accepted that there is a period of time anywhere from four to six weeks subsequent to delivery where they can be more at risk for hypertension,” Harwin said. “This is one of those complications that has been known to happen and has to be treated effectively and timely.”

The hospital agreed to send the case to voluntary binding arbitration, meaning it accepted liability, so damages were the only thing left to decipher. The case went before an arbitration panel, who act as finders of fact and limit noneconomic damages to $250,000 per claimant.

The dispute centered around Garcia's life expectancy and future care needs. While Harwin and Gunion's experts argued Garcia would need round-the-clock care for between 25 and 30 years, the defense brought experts who claimed her life expectancy was between six and 13 years.

While the defense offered between $6 million and $8 million, the plaintiffs claimed they needed more than that.

Defense counsel Teresita M. Baron of Wicker Smith O'Hara McCoy & Ford in Coral Gables extended her sympathies to the Garcia family on behalf of herself and her colleagues.

“We understand they're going through a difficult time and we're just hopeful that the award will serve its purpose,” Baron said. “We are sympathetic to the situation.”

For Harwin and Gunion, the case took on a “different dynamic” than it would before a judge and jury, who'd hear all about the emotional impact of their clients' ordeal. Instead, more panel members wanted to get down to specifics.

“This is what they do, so they are more sophisticated and they've heard similar-type issues before,” Harwin said.

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'Absolute nightmare'

In a minimally conscious state, Garcia is aware of her surroundings but has major physical limitations, according to Harwin. She can make eye contact and move her left arm, but has little movement in her lower body and severe spasticity in her right arm, meaning some of her muscles are constantly contracted, preventing movement.

Before the stroke, Garcia worked as a bookkeeper for a local shipping company and was a mother to two boys.

“It's night and day,” Harwin said. “Now she's not able to care for her children, certainly cannot be in any way gainfully employed and requires 24/7 attendant care.”

Garcia needs a carer 24/7 and a registered nurse three times a day to give her medication and feedings through a stomach tube. Harwin said it's been devastating for Garcia's husband, who's become her full-time caretaker, and for the children, who have had to undergo counseling.

“It's very, very difficult for them to see their mother in that condition,” Harwin said. “And the fact that she's unable to communicate with them has just been an absolute nightmare for the entire family.”

Garcia has made some progress in six months of therapy, Harwin said, and her loved ones are hopeful she will continue to improve,

“It's hard to know,” Harwin said. “The only way to really know that and the only way to give her that opportunity is to provide for her the very best care for as long as she could possibly need it.”

Though it couldn't fix what happened, the case did allow swift “finality” for the family for an incident that happened only 14 months ago. Typical medial malpractice cases take at least three or four years, which Harwin pointed out are the most crucial years for Harwin's rehabilitation.

Harwin said he and Gunion want to see maternal hypertension addressed in the U.S., which has seen its maternal death rate increase in the last 15 years, while it's plummeted in other modern countries.

A 2017 report from medical journal Lancet found that maternal death rates in the U.K have fallen so much that “a man is more likely to die while his partner is pregnant than she is,” while an NPR investigation discovered that American women are three times more likely than Canadians to die in the maternal period. The report also found that 700 and 900 women die — and 650,000 almost die — from childbirth-related complications every year.

“I think it should be important to everyone,” Harwin said. “A lot of it is a lack of communication amongst health care providers, and a lot of times health care providers see themselves as being too specialized and only seeing themselves as having limited roles rather than treating the patient, and that becomes problematic.”

Case: Johansi Zumoza Garcia, Wilmer Perez, Santiago Perez, Sebastian Perez and Marcela Perez v. Kendall Healthcare Group Ltd., doing business as Kendall Regional Medical Center

Case no.: 19-000167MA

Description: Medical negligence

Filing date: Jan. 9, 2019

Arbitration award date: May 31, 2019

Judge: Administrative Judge June McKinney

Plaintiffs attorneys: Daniel Harwin and Melissa Gunion, Freedland Harwin Valori, Fort Lauderdale

Defense attorneys: Oscar J. Cabanas and Teresita M. Baron, Wicker Smith O'Hara McCoy & Ford, Coral Gables; Robert E. Paradela, Wicker Smith O'Hara McCoy & Ford, Fort Lauderdale

Verdict amount: $15,277,819

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