Bad Anesthesiologist Busted By Patient Recording

A patient planned to use his smartphone to record his post-colonoscopy home instructions. When he listend afterwards, he found that he inadvertently recorded the whole procedure, including while he was unconscious during sedation.

To his dismay, this included extremely unprofessional discussions:

But as soon as he pressed play on his way home, he was shocked out of his anesthesia-induced stupor: He found that he had recorded the entire examination and that the surgical team had mocked and insulted him as soon as he drifted off to sleep.

In addition to their vicious commentary, the doctors discussed avoiding the man after the colonoscopy, instructing an assistant to lie to him, and then placed a false diagnosis on his chart.

The patient sued and was awarded total damages of $500,000.  For more details read the full piece, "Anesthesiologist trashes sedated patient — and it ends up costing her" (Washington Post, 6/23/2015).

On a related note, I do think that patients should consider recording their conversations with doctors in an open fashion, with mutual consent.  I discuss this in my recent Forbes piece, "Why You Should Record Your Doctor Visits" (Forbes, 2/16/2015.)

(Pictured below, Dr. Tiffany Ingham, the anesthesiologist in question.  Image from Washington Post article cited above.)