Romanucci & Blandin Reaches $1 million Settlement in Medical Negligence Lawsuit

After a week of trial in front of Judge Donald O’Brien, a urologist tendered his $1-million insurance policy on January 20, 2010, to settle a wrongful death case with the family of a deceased man arising out of the physician’s failure to timely diagnose bladder cancer.

In Russell v. Norris, M.D. and Northwest Suburban Urologists, Ltd. (Case no. 06 L 3887), Carmen Russell and Daniel Russell, Jr., the wife and son of Daniel Russell, reached a settlement with Jeffery Norris, M.D. and Northwest Suburban Urologists, Ltd. Attorney for the plantiffs was Stephan D. Blandin, of Romanucci & Blandin, LLC.

In late 2002, Daniel Russell was referred to Dr. Jeffery Norris of Northwest Suburban Urologists, seeking a second opinion regarding his complaints of urinary difficulties, including microscopic hematuria, flank pain, dysuria, and nocturia. Dr. Norris advised Russell that his issues were behavioral, that he needed to relax his sphincter, and that he had no risk to his upper or lower urinary tracts. Dr. Norris did not perform a cystoscopy, or any other procedure to rule out bladder cancer, despite Russell's presentation of early symptoms of bladder cancer.

In early 2004, Russell was again referred to Dr. Norris. Dr. Norris performed a cystoscopy that confirmed the presence of a tumor which was discovered to be late stage muscle invasive bladder cancer. Daniel Russell died in April of 2006 as a result of his cancer, leaving his wife and a minor son. Defense attorneys in the case were Randall Gudmundson and Erin Davis of Kominiarek, Bresler, Harvick, and Gudmundson,
LLC.