JEFFERSON COUNTY — A Jefferson County jury has awarded a Mt. Vernon woman $3.7 million in what may be the largest medical malpractice award ever given in the county.

(Credit: tomloel)
(Credit: tomloel)

A five-day trial ended Thursday with the jury finding against urologist Dr. Manoj Desai, and in favor of Marie Clatyon in the wrongful-death and medical malpractice lawsuit involving Clayton’s husband Robert Clayton.

A retired highway worker, Robert Clayton died December 16, 2009, after suffering a massive pulmonary embolism on his way to surgery and died.

Desai had performed laser treatment a month earlier on Robert Clayton for an enlarged prostate.

Two days later Robert Clayton found blood in his urine and was instructed by Desai to go to the emergency room at Good Samaritan Hospital in Mount Vernon. Clayton was admitted to the hospital on Dec. 14, 2009.

Two days later, Robert Clayton was being moved from his bed to a stretcher to go into surgery when he suffered a pulmonary embolism, which is a blockage of the lung’s main artery by a blood clot that has typically formed in a leg then breaks off and travels to the lung.

Marie Clayton claimed in her suit that Desai failed to consider the hospital’s recommendation that Robert Clayton was at high risk for deep-vein thrombosis, a blood clot, and didn’t prescribe preventative actions be taken.

Desai has since retired.

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