Salerno. The "wooden girl" case: a detailed expert report confirms the Cardarelli Hospital's responsibility.
A new appeal to the President of the Region, Vincenzo De Luca, by Mario Cicchetti, lawyer of the Manzo family, to resume negotiations for the payment of the compensation ordered by the judges in the first instance and intended for the care of Arianna Manzo, the 16-year-old from Cava de Tirreni, victim of a serious case of medical malpractice that left her deaf, visually impaired and tetraplegic.
I appeal to President De Luca to set up a meeting as soon as possible at Palazzo Santa Lucia in order to see this sad and shameful affair resolved following the payment to the minor of the well-known compensation that was awarded to her in the first instance, so that she can finally begin to receive treatment,” writes the lawyer in a long letter in which he reports the outcome of the super-expert report that will be filed in the appeal trial that is being held against the Cardarelli hospital in Naples.
In recent months Arianna's parents for this dad and mom of Arianna, Eugenio Manzo and Matilde Memoli, launched an appeal to the President of the Region, after the Cardarelli hospital in Naples had appealed the sentence of condemnation to pay 3 million euros in the first instance.
“Following the well-known first-instance ruling - which recognized the responsibility of the Aorn “Antonio Cardarelli” of Naples for the very serious pathology afflicting the minor, sentencing it to pay him the sum of three million euros -, the appeal phase is currently being held before the Civil Court of Appeal of Salerno”.
In May 2020, the judges delegated a new panel of experts to carry out a super-expertise assessment to evaluate the responsibilities and medical negligence against Ariana Manzo.
The panel composed of Cristoforo Pomara, a medical examiner from Catania, Antonino Giarratano, an anesthetist from Palermo, and Serenella Pignatti, a pediatrician from Florence, re-examined the case by sending the parties involved the draft of the report in which the serious inefficiencies in the care of the then little Arianna were reiterated.
“In a massive work consisting of just under 400 pages, the technical consultants confirmed the unequivocal responsibility of the health workers employed by the AORN “Antonio Cardarelli” of Naples in having caused the very serious and irreversible damage to the little girl,” writes the lawyer. The experts highlighted that during the hospitalization in March 2005 'not only were not all the therapies suitable for her treatment implemented, but there is no documentary evidence of adequate prevention of the same.' The newborn had been struck by a very serious infection.
“It is possible to make only a deductive judgment which, based on clinical-instrumental-laboratory data, is demonstrative of both the absence of a correct diagnostic and therapeutic path of the bronchiolitic process before, as well as of an inadequate treatment and a total absence of a preventive strategy and of contrast to infections subsequently which led to a progressive worsening of the general conditions of little Arianna pushed to the point of sepsis and which in fact must causally correlate to a progressive and inevitable irreversible brain damage” write the experts.
“Therefore, it is inexcusable not to have subjected the child to neurological monitoring from the beginning of her hospitalization onwards, which would have allowed us to obtain information on the cerebral situation, in a remaining clinical situation that was absolutely worsening. Information that would have allowed, or even indicated, the modification of therapeutic choices, both pharmacological and assistance-related”.
“Finally, it should be noted that the management of medical records is extremely confusing and not diligent, from which information is extracted with enormous difficulty.”
Lawyer Cicchetti, therefore, in light of this new expert report, launches a new appeal to the Region to reopen negotiations for the payment of compensation: "Considering the need for the Little Girl to undergo urgent and essential treatments for her survival - highlighted on several occasions over the years and, most recently, also through the request I filed with the Court last September 10 - not guaranteed by the National Health Service, the impossibility for the parents to offer them to her because they are extremely expensive and the willingness expressed to me by the President of the Campania region to resume any negotiations following the filing of this draft document, I appeal to President De Luca to set up, as soon as possible, a meeting at Palazzo Santa Lucia in order to see this sad and indecent affair defined"
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