$500,000 Awarded After Doctors Mock Patient During Surgery in Reston

By Ethan Levine (Patch Staff)

A man was awarded $500,000 this week after an anesthesiologist repeatedly mocked him while he was sedated during a colonoscopy in Reston.

The kicker? The man caught it all on tape, according to The Washington Post.

He had intended to record his doctor’s instructions after the procedure, ensuring nothing got lost in translation as he awoke from sedation. Instead, he inadvertently recorded the entire procedure, and it didn’t take long after he fell unconscious for the anesthesiologist, Tiffany M. Ingham, 42, to begin the ridicule.

The Washington Post reported the anesthesiologist and other medical professionals in the room made jokes at the patient’s expense and even placed a false diagnosis on his chart during the procedure.

Here are a few samplings from the man’s recording, via the Post.

“After five minutes of talking to you in pre-op,” the anesthesiologist told the sedated patient, “I wanted to punch you in the face and man you up a little bit,” she was recorded saying.

When a medical assistant noted the man had a rash, the anesthesiologist warned her not to touch it, saying she might get “some syphilis on your arm or something,” then added, “It’s probably tuberculosis in the penis, so you’ll be all right.”

When the assistant noted that the man reported getting queasy when watching a needle placed in his arm, the anesthesiologist remarked on the recording, “Well, why are you looking then, retard?”

WTOP reported Ingham also marked on the man’s chart that he had hemorrhoids when he did not.

Ingham and her lawyer did not return calls from the Post.

Upon hearing this recording during his trip home from the doctor’s office, the man sued the doctors for defamation and medical malpractice.

After a three-day trial, a Fairfax County judge ordered the anesthesiologist and her practice to pay the man a sum of $500,000: $100,000 for defamation, $200,000 for medical malpractice and another $200,000 for punitive damages.

Listen to audio clips from the colonoscopy below, as reported by The Washington Post.