Rob Nelson
Times Staff Writer
January 17, 1998

      TAMPA - A Pasco County man sued University Community Hospital Friday, saying surgeons there operated on the wrong part of his neck in 1996, a charge that adds to the hospital's list of embarrassing legal troubles.
       An attorney for Sean E. O'Reilly, 40, of Wesley Chapel and his wife filed suit in Hillsborough Circuit Court asking for more than $5 million in punitive and compensatory damages.
      The suit says O'Reilly and his wife, Lona, have suffered permanent bodily injuries, mental anguish and lost wages as a result of "medical malpractice and the continuing failure of University Community Hospital to protect the public from …preventable episodes of medical negligence."
      O'Reilly's "wrong site" surgery took place in 1996, the suit says, just months after UCH doctors and staff made a series of other errors: amputating the wrong leg of Tampa resident Willie King; performing arthroscopic surgery on the wrong knee of a patient; removing a 21 year old woman's healthy right ovary instead of her diseased left one; and accidentally disconnecting the respirator that was keeping 77 year old Leo Alfonso alive.
      "We're looking at (UCH's) pattern of conduct over a course of time," said Tampa lawyer C. Steven Yerrid, who represents the O'Reillys. "I'm not aware of a situation like this anywhere else in the country."
      O'Reilly was admitted to UCH to have two vertebrae in his neck fused because of a slipped disk, Yerrid said. But because he already had two other vertebrae that were fused since birth, the neurosurgeon performing the operation miscounted and ended up fusing the wrong two bones, the suit says.
      "My understanding is that a congenital fusion is rare, like if you were operating on a one-legged man," Yerrid said. "It's something you would notice."
      O'Reilly was admitted to the hospital's emergency room two weeks before his surgery because of complications in his pre-operation procedure, Yerrid said. Doctors who examined him then made a note of his existing vertebrae fusion, but their reports were either ignored or never seen by the surgeons who operated on O'Reilly, the suit says.
      Dr. William O. DeWeese, 55, the neurosurgeon who operated on O'Reilly, was also named in the lawsuit, but could not be reached for comment Friday night. Hospital officials said they were unaware of O'Reilly's lawsuit.
      "We haven't even received a copy of it yet," said Tammy Hunt, the hospital's marketing manager. "So until we do, we really can't comment one way or the other."
      Yerrid, who would not allow his client to speak to reporters Friday night, said O'Reilly is in pain, may need another operation and will be unable to return to his job as a crew supervisor for Tampa Electric Co.
      "He has such limited range of motion that he'll probably have to be totally retrained," Yerrid said. "But he's also got three teenage kids who will want to play sports with him. That's what he's going to miss out on the most, I'm afraid."

01/17/98