Since 2005, over one hundred people reliant on ventilator machines to breathe have died due to caregivers failing to respond to warning alarms.

According to the Boston Globe, 119 deaths have occurred between 2005 and May 2011 relating to warning alarms. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is highly concerned about this problem and issued a warning to caregivers in hospitals, nursing facilities, and patients’ homes that ventilator alarms are going unheard.

Alarm fatigue, a condition related to nurses becoming desensitized to beeps and alarms after hearing them all day, has become a serious issue among hospitals.

If you or a loved one has experienced hospital negligence, contact Pennsylvania hospital negligence attorneys of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. today by calling 610-667-7511.

Pennsylvania medical malpractice lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. are excited to announce the Narberth Dickens Festival starting Dec 10.

The annual Narberth Dickens Festival is one of the most celebrated holiday traditions in the Philadelphia area.  Downtown Narberth is transformed into 1840′s London complete with characters from “A Christmas Carol” roaming the streets in full costume.  There is also a scavenger hunt for the kids to win a prize.  At 11am, a free screening of “A Muppet Christmas Carol” will be held.

Festival runs from 12-4pm. For more information, visit the Narberth Dickens Festival website.

The Pennsylvania medical malpractice lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. are happy to announce that this Friday, December 2, marks the beginning of the holiday house tours taking place in Philadelphia.

Fairmount Park is putting on it’s annual Holiday Tours for two weeks during the month of December. Six historic homes in the neighborhood will be open for guided tours. The houses will have holiday decorations displayed throughout and there will be a guide at each home to take guests on the tour.

The houses included in this year’s tour are Laurel and Lemon Hill, Cedar Grove, Sweetbriar, Mount Pleasant and Woodford Mansion. Reservations for the tours are not necessary and there is parking provided at each location.

For more information regarding holiday tours in the Philadelphia area, please visit the Philly Tour website today.

Patricio Munoz, 20, of New Jersey was killed Friday in West York, PA after a piece construction fell on him.

According to police, the accident occurred at the first block of South Highland Avenue at the Carriage Works Redevelopment project.  The area can also be known as the old Keystone Weaving Mill building.

Though details have not been confirmed, authorities believe that Munoz was operating a Pettibone lift when the equipment began to shake from the wind.  Munoz got out the machinery, but it fell on top of him.  He was killed on impact.

He was working for SM Home Improvement, a company based out of Danville, N.J.

If you or a loved one has been injured or worse while working on a construction site, contact Pennsylvania personal injury lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. today by calling 610-667-7511.

Richard McCade, 62, was awarded $2M in a medical malpractice lawsuit against Dr. Michael Resnick and Dr. Lawrence M Wald of Wills Eye Hospital in Pennsylvania.

McCade filed a lawsuit against both doctors after each individually ruptured his colon during a routine colonoscopy. Resnick operated first and was found to be 60 percent responsible by the Philadelphia jury. Wald operated second with intention of fixing the complications of the first surgery, but punctured McCade’s colon a second time. Wald is held 40 percent responsible. McCade has had a total of 2 feet of his colon removed due to the surgical mistakes by the doctors.

If you have been a victim of medical malpractice, it is important to have experienced representation on your side. Contact the Pennsylvania medical malpractice lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. today by calling 610-667-7511.

A hospital is being sued after transplanting a kidney that was infected with hepatitis C from one person to the other.

The couple is claiming that the transplant took place even though the hospital received the medical tests determining that the kidney contained the hepatitis C disease. The tests were completed several months prior to the actual transplant and they are citing negligence in their lawsuit due to the fact that no one noticed the results of the tests.

The woman who was diagnosed with hepatitis C wasn’t notified of this condition until a month after the actual transplant at which time she was offered the option of keeping it a secret from her partner.

During the investigation of this case, the transplant division of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center was shut down.

The hospital has recognized it’s mistake and claims it to be a medical as well as human error.

If you or someone you know has been the victim of medical malpractice, please contact the Pennsylvania medical malpractice lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. by calling 610-667-7511 today.

A West Virginia hospital and three physicians are being sued because of medical malpractice that resulted in a wrongful death.

Leslie Connolly filed the lawsuit in Monogalia Circuit Court after her husband, Joseph Connolly, died last month from an overdose on methadone that was given to him by his doctors. Potomac Valley Hospital, West Virginia University Medical Corporation, and Drs. Joy E. Cousins, James Abel, and Tamer Gaber were named as defendants in the lawsuit.

As stated in the lawsuit, Dr. Cousins, who assumed Connolly was already taking methadone daily, gave the patient a 40 mg dosage of the drug. The next day, Dr. Gaber prescribed 50 mg of methadone when Connolly was transferred to Potomac Valley Hospital.

It was determined that Connolly died from an overdose of methadone which resulted in anoxic encephalopathy. According to The U.S. National Center for Health Statistics, the number of deaths related to methadone overdoses increased from 790 to 3,849 between the years 1999 and 2004.

If you have lost a loved one due to a pharmaceutical error which resulted in wrongful death, contact the Pennsylvania wrongful death attorneys of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C., by calling 610-667-7511 today.

A Maryland jury awarded $2.5 million to a family involved in a medical malpractice lawsuit.

59-year-old Lawrence Dixon went in to Montgomery General Hospital for treatment after falling and breaking his pelvis in May of 2007. Two days later, Dixon died. Dr. David Harding, who was Dixon’s primary care physician, failed to diagnose the man as suffering from hemorrhagic shock, leading to the filing of the lawsuit.

Dixon’s family believes that his life could have been saved had the doctor noticed the internal bleeding that was causing his organs to fail. According to a lawyer for the family, there were many signs that should have caught Dr. Harding’s attention, including the fact that Dixon had gone 24 hours without producing urine.

$1 million in non-economic damages has been awarded to Dixon’s wife and his estate, and each of his two children received $250,000.

If you have lost a loved one due to hospital or physician negligence, contact the Pennsylvania medical malpractice attorneys of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C., by calling 610-667-7511.

According to a study that has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine, physicians can expect to be faced with a malpractice lawsuit at some point during their career.

Malpractice data for around 41,000 doctors has been examined and analyzed from the years 1991 to 2005. It has been discovered by Harvard University researchers that for doctors in high-risk fields, around 99 percent will face a malpractice claim by the age of 65. The probability drops to 75 percent for physicians in low-risk fields.

The fear of being sued has caused physicians to resort to defensive medicine and the ordering of extra tests to avoid such lawsuits. Lawmakers believe that the practice of defensive medicine is to blame for the increase in costs associated with health care.

If you or someone you love has been the victim of medical malpractice, contact the Pennsylvania medical malpractice lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. by calling 610-667-7511 today.

An Army soldier has reached a $2.15 million settlement with the federal government in a medical malpractice lawsuit.

According to court documents, U.S. District Court Judge John Nixon in Nashville on Friday approved the settlement of the medical malpractice claim made by Staff Sergeant Adam Cloer, of Missouri. Cloer filed the lawsuit on behalf of his wife Melodee Cloer, who died last year after being diagnosed with rectal cancer. The settlement is subject to final approval by the U.S. Attorney General.

According to the lawsuit, Melodee Cloer first went to the hospital at Fort Campbell with symptoms in 2006 complaining of pain, blood in her stool, and constipation. The lawsuit said she went to the hospital on multiple occasions complaining of the symptoms, but was diagnosed with hemorrhoids. A bariatric surgeon recommended the hospital perform a colonoscopy. The lawsuit alleged the hospital failed to follow-up on that recommendation or provide any rectal cancer screenings.

The U.S. Attorney representing the government declined to comment on the settlement. The settlement is not an admission of liability or guilt.

If you need assistance with a medical malpractice lawsuit involving a misdiagnosis, please contact the Pennsylvania misdiagnosis lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C., by calling 610-667-7511.