Bx. gran wins $110M in malpractice suit vs. hosp

A Bronx grandmother was awarded a whopping $110.6 million in a malpractice lawsuit against St. Barnabas Hospital and several doctors over their care of a December 2010 asthma attack that triggered a massive brain injury, keeping the matriarch hospitalized and in a nursing home for nearly a year and leaving her with crippling — and lifelong — speech and motor deficits.

The jury verdict Friday in Bronx Supreme Court was a stunning victory for Keimoneia Redish, 48, the mom of five sons and one grandchild who argued that doctors failed to consider transferring her to another facility with more advanced care needed for a swelling in the brain caused by the buildup of carbon dioxide.

“I felt numb,” Redish told the Daily News of her reaction to the verdict. “I’ve been fighting for so long.”

“I was angry,” she added. “But I put it aside. … I came to the reality — I have to deal with it.”

Redish, whose speech is slurred and who is in a wheelchair with profound motor disabilities, is now cared for full time by her partner of 26 years, Clarence Darden, a former chef. “She went through a lot,” he told The News. “We went through so much, I’m just so happy for her now.”

Redish’s lawyer Richard Gurfein said the suit against St. Barnabas, Dr. Darryl Adler, Dr. Richard Stumacher, Dr. Abdurham Ahmed and the estate of Dr. Ronald Ciubutaro centered around their decision to continue treating Redish at the hospital rather than transferring her to nearby facilities where technology known as ECMO, or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, was available to remove the excessive carbon dioxide in her brain and prevent an injury.

Redish finally went home in October 2011, after 328 days in the hospital and nursing home, Gurfein said.

During her trial, Redish fought back against the suggestion that she hadn’t done enough to promote her own recovery from the devastating injury.

“I heard [the defense lawyer] say I fell using the walker because I always tried to walk,” Redish said during her testimony, a transcript of the proceeding read to The News by Gurfein showed. “But I fell that day because I refused to be down. I don’t want to be this way.”

“She was an amazing mom, the vice president of the PTA,” Gurfein said. “She was the center of the family.”