The plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed against the Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. and the Saipan Health Clinic are demanding a jury trial in their civil suit alleging medical malpractice. <\/p>\n
The plaintiffs\u2014the biological parents and grandparent of a now 2-year old who experienced Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy or HIE, birth trauma and other injuries as a result of the alleged malpractice\u2014have recently filed their third amended complaint and a motion demanding that the Superior Court set a jury trial on the matter. <\/p>\n
According to the third amended complaint, the plaintiffs are alleging medical malpractice and violations of equal protection for the infant. They named CHCC, SHC, and physician Helen Taro-Atalig as defendants. Taro-Atalig is an employee of the Health Professional Corp. that does business as Saipan Health Clinic, a private medical clinic. <\/p>\n
The plaintiffs are asking for an award of damages and future damages for pain and suffering, emotional distress, mental anguish, and diminished quality of life.<\/p>\n
According to the lawsuit, on May 7, 2020, plaintiffs gave birth to their first child at CHCC. The child allegedly suffered from HIE, a type of brain dysfunction that occurs when the brain doesn’t receive enough oxygen or blood flow for a period of time, as a result of the birthing process. <\/p>\n
The plaintiffs allege that Taro-Atalig was the primary care provider of obstetrical care for the pregnancy and delivery of plaintiffs\u2019 child but CHCC employees assisted in the delivery of the child.<\/p>\n
The plaintiffs noted that Taro-Atalig, being the primary care provider, controlled all material aspects of the delivery. <\/p>\n
Meanwhile, CHCC has also filed a motion with the Superior Court requesting that they be dismissed from this lawsuit with prejudice. <\/p>\n
CHCC, through assistant attorney general Stephen Anson, argues that dismissal of plaintiffs\u2019 first cause of action for medical malpractice against CHCC is warranted because, as a matter of law, CHCC cannot be held vicariously liable for the actions of a private physician. <\/p>\n
Anson also argued that the plaintiffs fail to state a direct medical malpractice claim against CHCC because Taro-Atalig was the primary care provider responsible for the medical decisions concerning the plaintiffs\u2019 delivery of their child. <\/p>\n
Further. Anson argues that the plaintiffs retained Taro-Atalig from SHC for medical services concerning the birth of their first child. \u201cEven though Taro-Atalig is not an employee of CHCC, she has physician privileges at CHCC,\u201d Anson said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed against the Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. and the Saipan Health…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":378086,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[666,12153],"class_list":["post-378085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","tag-chcc","tag-shc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=378085"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378085\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/378086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=378085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=378085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=378085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}