MARY KAY GRANT, JOHN GRANT, JOHN GRANT as Administrator of the Estate of Christopher Grant and as Parent and Next Friend of Christopher Grant, and DEBORAH HOWARD v. JAMES SCHRAND, M.D.;, MARK SANDER, M.D.; and HESS, SCHRAND & SANDE

Medical malpractice - Deborah Howard (Howard) was a patient of Dr. Schrand and Dr.
Sander for many years. Her initial complaint in the early 1980's
was of migraine headaches, and she was given injections of
Demerol in the doctors' offices to relieve her pain. Howard later
developed interstitial cystitis, and Demerol was again used
to manage this painful condition and was administered by a
patient-controlled analgesia (PCA) pump during her
hospitalizations. Howard's pain worsened to the point where Dr.
Sander prescribed Demerol to be self-administered by a PCA pump
for her use at home in July 1991.

Howard continued to work as a deputy circuit clerk in Boone
County after receiving the pump. On August 29, 1991, Dr. Schrand
was informed by a nurse from Olsten Home Health Care, Inc.
(Olsten), who had been summoned to the courthouse where Howard
worked, that Howard was suspected of overdosing on Demerol.
Olsten was a nursing service that had been employed to maintain
the PCA pump, to change the cassettes which held the medication,
to check to see that the pump was working properly, and to adjust
the dosages when ordered to do so by the doctors. Dr. Schrand
then spoke with Howard by telephone and advised her to go to a
hospital. Howard declined to do so on the ground that she feared
she would lose her job if she missed more work. Dr. Schrand then
allowed Howard to go home.

Arrangements were made whereby the nurse would drive Howard
home. However, once Howard and the nurse reached the parking lot,
Howard insisted that she be allowed to drive her vehicle home.
The nurse allowed her to do so and stated that she would follow
her home and check her again. While driving herself home,
Howard's vehicle collided with a vehicle being driven by Mary Kay
Grant in which her twelve-year-old son, Christopher
Grant, was a passenger. Christopher was killed in
the collision, and Mary Kay was severely injured. Mary Kay, her
husband, and Christopher's estate later filed suit against the
doctors, the nurse, Olsten, Howard, and others.

The
found the doctors to be fifty percent (50%) responsible for the
Grants' injuries, Howard to be twenty-five percent (25%)
responsible, and Olsten and another home health service to be
twenty-five percent (25%) responsible. The amount of the verdict is unknown at this time.

Unknown

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Affirmed by the Court of Appeals of Kentucky on July 2, 1999. The date shown above is the date of the appellate court decision and not the trial date.