Doctor wins claim that lawsuit was frivolous

In the Courts. By Tanya Albert, AMNews staff. Sept. 12, 2005.

It's frustrating enough for a physician to be named in a lawsuit solely because his or her name was entered on a chart after seeing a patient briefly. It's even more irksome to need to spend the time and energy to be dropped from the lawsuit.

But imagine the aggravation level if you can't seem to get dropped from the court case, even if the plaintiff can't find a medical expert to say that you've done something outside the standard of care. In fact, you are the one credited with saving a patient's life.

Ohio gastroenterologist Zev Randy Maycon, MD, doesn't have to imagine. He knows the aggravation firsthand.

But he's also now one of the few physicians to know the rare satisfaction of taking a lawyer to task for filing a frivolous lawsuit and winning.

Dr. Maycon was the on-call physician at Mercy Medical Center in Canton, Ohio, on an April night in 2001. He handled the evening like any physician on call would, starting with a call from nurses around 6:30 p.m. to update him on patients. They told him that a patient who underwent a liver biopsy performed by another physician in Dr. Maycon's practice earlier that day was in stable condition.

Later that evening, the patient, Benjamin Barbato, complained of abdominal pain, cramping, soreness, nausea and other ailments. The nurses gave Barbato medication, but according to court records it's undisputed that they never called Dr. Maycon to tell him about Barbato's symptoms or complaints. There also was no evidence that the nursing staff tried to reach Dr. Maycon between 6:35 p.m. and 9:31 a.m. when Barbato's wife called Dr. Maycon at his office.