ROBBED OF BEING MOM
Actress’ $50M suit hits doc’s errors
A MANHATTAN actress lost her shot at motherhood after a Manhattan gynecologist misdiagnosed the 41-year-old pregnant woman’s vaginal bleeding as the result of “old age,” “cysts,” and finally “ovarian cancer,” according to a new lawsuit.
It wasn’t until two months after patient Mihaela Mihut first sought treatment that Dr. Neena Agarwala gave her a pregnancy test, the suit says.
The test came back positive, but Mihut’s joy was short-lived.
The bleeding stemmed from an ectopic pregnancy that Agarwala failed to diagnose — and the radiation used to terminate it has made it “extremely inadvisable” for Mihut, now 44, to get pregnant in the next few years, the suit said.
“The loss to Ms. Mihut is incalculable, and her pain indescribable,” said Mihut’s lawyer, Thomas Mullaney, in the suit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court.
“No words can capture the despair to a woman of being stripped of her ability to bear children. And no excuse can correct it,” he said.
The Romanian-born beauty’s ordeal began in August 2012 when she first visited Agarwala, who practiced out of Kips Bay Gynecology on Park Ave. South.
Mihut was suffering from brutal symptoms, the suit said.
“She was suffering severe and uncontrollable vaginal bleeding and experiencing acute pain in her vaginal area,” court papers claimed. “She was also experiencing significant fatigue, no doubt as a result of pronounced blood loss.”
The suit said Agarwala initially dismissed Mihut’s bleeding as the result of “old age.” Agarwala went on to say cysts were the likely culprit — and recommended a hysterectomy, the suit said.
A nervous Mihut declined to schedule the surgery. But in a later visit she did agree to a different surgery to remove the cysts after Agarwala inexplicably changed her tune on the need for a hysterectomy, the suit said.
Agarwala, who has been sanctioned in Nebraska and Pennsylvania, pronounced Mihut healed — but her pain and bleeding persisted, court documents said.
On Oct. 17, 2012, the doctor gave Mihut a blood test for a different procedure. A week later, she called Mihut with surprising news.
“Congratulations, you’re pregnant,” the doctor told her, the suit said. Mihut’s emotional rollercoaster
took a devastating turn a few days later. After enduring a painful sonogram test, Agarwala said she had ovarian cancer and a tumor, the suit alleged.
A shell-shocked Mihut, still in the examination room, reached out to her doctor sister. The sister immediately suspected an ectopic pregnancy, which occurs when an embryo implants outside the uterus.
Agarwala admitted minutes later Mihut did in fact have an ectopic pregnancy — not cancer, the suit said. Mihut was rushed to Mount Sinai, where Agarwala is an associate director, and given intensive radiation treatments. Still, her symptoms persisted until she was treated at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Weill Cornell in November 2012, the suit said.
Mihut is seeking $50 million in damages from Agarwala, Kips Bay Gynecology and Mount Sinai.
Agarwala, who has split from and sued Kips Bay Gynecology, didn’t return requests for comment, and a Mount Sinai spokesman declined comment. Kips Bay Gynecology couldn’t be reached.