Medical Malpractice $1,000,000 Verdict $5,000,000 Verdict $2,000,000 Verdict $5,300,000 Verdict $1,700,000 Verdict $1,000,000 Settlement $5,250,000 Verdict $1,700,000 Verdict $1,700,000 Verdict $3,000,000 Verdict Employee Discrimination $6,800,000 Settlement $1,5000,000 Verdict $3,200,000 Verdict $494,500 Verdict Personal Injury $15,000,000 Verdict $1,039,000 Verdict $4,000,000 Verdict $1,500,000 Settlement $4,500,000 Verdict $3,000,000 Settlement $1,800,000 Verdict $1,500,000 Settlement $244,000 Verdict $922,000 Verdict $425,000 Verdict $1,300,000 Verdict $380,000 Verdict $2,300,000 Verdict "The right of trial by jury shall be secure to all and remain inviolate" Florida Constitution Article 1 Section 22 (1885) October 29, l996 $1,700,000 Surgery That Caused Paralysis Tuesday, October 29, 1996 Trial begins in surgery that caused paralysis By SUE CARLTON Times staff Writer TAMPA - Four years ago this month, Pat McEachern was fixing dinner for her family, enjoying a football game on television, living a normal, if unremarkable, life.      It was Oct. 18, 1992, a night when a chain of events began that would leave McEachern, then 50, paralyzed on the right side of her body.      It also would lead to a crusade for hospital patients' rights and a lawsuit that blames her condition on a medical resident who was allowed to perform a surgical procedure while a more experienced doctor looked on.      "She had her health, and she had her happiness," attorney Wil Florin told a jury as the civil case opened Monday, pointing out his client's cane and the brace on her leg. "The biggest thing you'll hear that she lost (is that before), she didn't bear the burden of worrying about being a burden."      But attorney David Banker, representing the Florida Board of Regents, the defendant in the lawsuit, told the jury it was not there to make decisions about medical education or how residents should be trained. He said its job was to decide if Daniel Bierne, who was in a radiology residency program through the University of South Florida College of Medicine, had been negligent.      Banker contended that Bierne did exactly what he was told to do, and that other factors, including the delicate brain surgery McEachern later underwent, could well have caused the paralysis.      McEachern had just made dinner for her family that night when she went to lie down with a headache. Her family later found her ill and unresponsive, and took her to a hospital.      A brain aneurysm was suspected, and she was transferred to Tampa General Hospital. There, doctors scheduled a cerebral angiogram, in which a catheter is inserted through the body to inspect the brain.      A doctor discussed the risks of the procedure with McEachern. Florin told the jury that the doctor then introduced Bierne as his assistant but didn't say that Bierne, four months out of medical school, was a resident who had done the procedure four times.   Primary Office 777 Alderman Road Palm Harbor, Florida 34683 Boca Raton Office 2255 Glades Road Suit 324A Boca Raton, Florida 33431 Orlando Office Millenia Lakes 1 Suite 175 Orlando, Florida 32839 St. Petersburg Office 450 Carillon Parkway Suite 120 St. Petersburg, Florida 33716 New Port Richey Office 2505 Seven Springs Blvd. Suite 13 New Port Richey, Florida 34655 727-786-5000 (local) - 800-226-6581 (toll free) - 727-772-9833 (fax) - fr@florinroebig.com (email) © 2008 Florin | Roebig. All rights reserved.

florida law firms