PANEL SAYS BOOTH HOSPITAL ERRED IN WOMAN'S DEATH

By Don Bean, Staff Writer

The family of a 33-year old woman who died in 1981 following the birth of her daughter at Booth Memorial Hospital has been awarded $750,000 by an arbitration panel that said the mother died because she was given too much medicine.

The Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court medical malpractice administration panel in a split decision, ruled against the hospital and Drs. Martin Schneider, Stanley Post and Stanley Pollock in the death of Debrah Jackson, who lived on E. 146th Street.

According to Lawrence Landskroner, the lawyer for the woman's family, Jackson was admitted on March 11, 1981. She gave birth by Caesarean section to a daughter, Alice, who weighed 3 pounds, 12 ounces. She was six weeks premature.

Landskroner put the girl, now 5, on the stand and asked, "When you have a problem who do you talk to?" The girl replied, "I talk to God."

The mother also is survived by her husband, James, an orderly at Huron Road Hospital, and a son, Darren, 16.

The mother died about 14 hours after Alice was born. In the majority ruling, arbitrators said that Jackson "was being treated with five different drugs, four of which are central nervous system depressants."

"Shortly after having undergone a general anesthesia, Debrah Jackson was medicated with phenobarbital, Demerol and Phenergan, all superimposed on a magnesium sulfate infusion," the opinion said.

Landskroner said no blood tests were conducted during the post-mortem to determine what role drugs played in Jackson's death.

As dissenting arbitrator said, "It is recognized that as an unfortunate matter of daily occurrence, human beings die despite the best medical care that can be rendered...In that context, fairness dictates a judgment that the death of Mrs. Jackson was not caused by the negligence of the defendants."

Robert C. Buck, lawyer for Booth Memorial, said the verdict, which is not binding, would be appealed and would go to trial before a Common Pleas judge.

Buck was critical of the medical arbitration system. "It leaves a lot to be desired. It should be done away with and replaced by trial. Everything has its faults, but trial has the least faults."

Lawyers for the doctors could not be reached.