CHOP To Pay $10M In Malpractice Suit

Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia will pay more than $10 million for failing to diagnose a boy’s bacterial meningitis, a jury decided Monday.

The Inquirer reports a Philadelphia Common Pleas Court awarded a mother and her son the money because physicians did not diagnose his illness after numerous emergency room visits to the renowned hospital.

The boy, who is now 6, came down with the illness as an infant. He has suffered numerous complications from the disease, including hearing loss, language disorder, developmental and learning delays, and a loss of balance, according to the Inquirer.

The Philadelphia Business Journal reports the boy visited the emergency room three days in a row in December 2009. He was not immediately diagnosed.

His family said the hospital should have done more blood work and analysis to quickly diagnose the disease before it had serious complications.