MORGANTOWN – A Monongalia County mother blames substandard medical care for permanent birth defects suffered by her son.
Raeshean Simmons, as mother and next friend of K.R., filed her complaint in Monongalia Circuit Court against West Virginia University Hospitals and the WVU Board of Governors. Though not named as defendants, several individuals – Dr. Ossama Elsaccar, Dr. Michaela Lamonde, APRN and midwife Betsy Miller and CNM Kayla Pop-Steurer are named in the lawsuit.
“We look forward to helping this young couple so they can afford the incredible cost of raising and supporting a child with such a lifelong devastating injury,” attorney L. Dante diTrapano told The West Virginia Record.
diTrapano
According to the complaint, Simmons was admitted to WVU Hospitals on January 18, 2020, for the delivery of her son. She says signs of fetal distress were significant. Those include deceleration of the boy’s fetal heart rate and failure to adequately progress in labor, which led to a delay in his delivery.
K.R. was delivered at 9:52 a.m. on January 19, 2020, and suffers from severe and permanent injuries related to his fetal distress and delayed delivery, including complications related to hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy.
Simmons says WVU Hospital employees breached the applicable standards of care during labor and delivery. And she says those failures led to K.R.’s injuries.
She accuses both defendants of vicarious liability and medical negligence. She seeks compensatory damages for past and future medical and life care expenses, past and future physical pain and suffering, past and future loss of earnings, past and future loss of enjoyment of life as well as past and future annoyance, embarrassment, humiliation and inconvenience.
She also seeks punitive damages, saying the actions of the defendants were willful, wanton and with a reckless disregard to harm. In addition, she seeks pre- and post-judgment interests, court costs and other fees.
Simmons is being represented by diTrapano and Davi H. Carriger of Calwell Luce diTrapano in Charleston and by Richard D. Lindsay II and Dr. Richard D. Lindsay of Tabor Lindsay & Associates in Charleston.
Monongalia Circuit Court case number 22-C-192