A jury cleared two doctors of liability in the case of a woman whose blurred vision and headache were diagnosed as a migraine, only to suffer a recurrence several months later that left her semi-blind from what was found to be a stroke.

The plaintiff, a neonatologist, had sued the physician who made the initial diagnosis, as well as the doctor who treated her for migraines—a colleague at the same medical practice. According to attorneys on both sides, a confidential high-low agreement reached after the close of evidence in the two-week trial means there will be no appeal.

The case was complicated for a number of reasons, not the least of which was a Court of Appeals ruling decreeing that a statute of limitations issue should be decided by the jury.

“This was really interesting case for a couple of reasons,” said Huff Powell & Bailey partner Scott Bailey, who represented one of the defendants.

“It was very complex medically, and there were big causation issues, and there was this Court of Appeals issue looming over everything,” he said. “We thought there was a good chance that—no matter what happened—we'd be back before the Court of Appeals.”

“The high-low was primarily about our clients' wanting to finally put and end to this case,” said Bailey, who represented neurologist Edward McDonald along with firm attorneys Lindsey Costakos and Weymon Forrester.

The co-defendant, neurologist Laroy Penix, was represented by Thomas Cole and Jeremy Panter of Gainesville's Whelchel, Dunlap, Jarrard & Walker. They did not respond to a request for comment.

The plaintiffs, Kelly Adams and her husband, were represented by Matthew Cook of Gainesville's Cook Law Group and Jonathan Parrish of the Parrish Law Firm.

“We were disappointed,” said Cook, “but the case had significant legal issues that made it difficult to try for our side.”

The high-low “reflected the uncertainty on both sides, I think,” Cook said.

According to the lawyers and court filings, the case began in January 2013 when Adams, then 38, was at work in the neonatal intensive care unit at the Northeast Georgia Medical Center in Gainesville.

She was speaking to a nurse when she got dizzy and experienced a burning pain in her head, blurry vision and difficulty speaking.

The nurse put her in a wheelchair and took her to the emergency room, where the attending physician asked Penix to evaluate her.

Penix called for an MRI and other testing for Adams circulation and ultimately diagnosed her with benign positional vertigo and migraine, and ordered her to follow up with an eye, ear, nose and throat doctor.

She also began consulting with McDonald who—like Adams—worked for Longstreet Clinic P.C.

McDonald treated Adams for migraines for several months until September 2013, when she had another spell of dizziness, headache and blurred vision, along with tingling and numbness on her right side.

She once again went to the ER at Northeast Georgia, where the attending physician suspected she might have had a stroke and ordered an echocardiogram that revealed a tumor in the left ventricle of her heart.

The tumor was surgically removed, but Adams' stroke caused brain damage, leaving her with only half her vision in each eye, memory and processing difficulties, headaches and a seizure disorder.

Matt Cook, Cook Law Group, Gainesville, Georgia

Cook said that Adams eventually returned to work at Longstreet part-time but was only able to put in about 20 percent of the hours she had formerly worked. In what Cook conceded was an awkward arrangement, she remained there until early this year, even as her case against her employer and co-worker was pending.

Adams sued McDonald and his practice, Longstreet, along with Penix and his employer, Northeast Georgia Physicians Group, in Fulton County State Court.

The defendants moved for summary judgment, arguing that the two-year statute of limitations for medical malpractice barred the lawsuit.

State Court Chief Judge Diane Bessen agreed and dismissed the case, but the Court of Appeals ruled last year that there was “conflicting evidence” as to whether Adams had suffered a brain injury from the earlier event and whether she might have, indeed, been experiencing migraines until she had the stroke.

“A jury must decide the cause of the intervening symptoms Kelly Adams experienced between the January and September [incidents] to ascertain whether or not the statute of limitations bars her claims,” the opinion said.

During the trial that began May 20, Bailey said the co-defendants presented a united defense and argued there was no violation of the standard of care.

Key plaintiffs' experts included neurologist John Rothrock of the George Washington University School of Medicine & Health Sciences, cardiologist Tom Thomas of Vanderbilt University and economist Frank Adams, formerly of Kennesaw State University, Cook said.

Defense experts included neurologists Jay Schecter with the Harbin Clinic in Rome, and Robert J. Adams from Charleston, South Carolina.

During closing arguments, Cook said he asked for damages between $9 million and $15 million.

“We gave then a range of special damages for her lost wages claim; she was only a year into her practice when this happened,” he said.  

Evidence closed Thursday afternoon, and the jury returned Friday morning to begin deliberations.

They returned with a straight defense verdict after about three hours.

“That was pretty fast for a complex medical malpractice case,” Bailey said.

Afterward, jurors said they were “troubled” by the fact that Adams kept working for Longstreet for so many years and they had indicated that 10 of the 12 panelists voted for the defense from the outset, Bailey said.

He also said the bottom end of the high-low struck while the jury was out “was about the same amount we had offered in an offer of judgment a couple of months before trial, so we felt very good about the outcome.”