KUALA LUMPUR: The government has been ordered to pay the widow of a prominent lawyer RM2 million in damages in a medical negligence case.
The case involved Jayshree LC Doshi, the widow of former Asian International Arbitration Centre director Vinayak Pradhan, suing two government doctors.
The first defendant is a National Cancer Institute (NCI) radiologist while the other is a Kuala Lumpur Hospital plastic surgeon.
High Court Judge Datuk Akhtar Tahir found the first defendant liable but dismissed the suit against the second defendant.
The government was ordered to pay Jayshree RM800,000 for pain and suffering, RM700,000 in special damages and RM500,000 in aggravated damages.
Akhtar also ordered the government to pay RM250,000 in costs to Jayshree, whose husband died on March 8, 2020.
However, she was ordered to pay RM30,000 in costs for the failed suit against the second defendant and the government.
In his judgement released last week, Akhtar said aggravated damages were awarded as the firs defendant did not show compassion after being informed on burns suffered by Vinayak.
"He also took a lackadaisical attitude in responding to the distress of the plaintiff and the deceased," the judge said, adding the defendant did not show any remorse when testifying.
Akthar said Vinayak was healthy before he underwent a radiofrequency ablation (RFA) procedure, which later left him bedridden and in excruciating pain.
As a result, he had to undergo various medical procedures.
According to the case facts, Vinayak developed a thymic neuroendocrine tumour and underwent surgery in 1998 and 2004.
In September 2017, the tumour resurfaced and he was referred to NCI.
The following month a meeting involving NCI doctors from different disciplines, including the radiologist, decided that the tumor be treated by cryoablation, which involves the use of extremely cold temperatures to destroy cancerous tissues.
However, in December 2017, the radiologist decided to perform the RFA procedure instead.
Jayshree and her husband were not informed that the NCI meeting recommended cryoablation.
She only found out about it from a medical report she received from NCI in 2020 after Vinayak's death.
Akhtar said the radiologist had induced the couple to agree to the RFA by telling them it carried minimal risk.
He said if Jayshree or Vinayak had known of the potential risk, they would have sought a second opinion and doubted if the radiologist had a detailed surgery plan.
Jayshree was represented by lawyers Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan, James Khong and Edwin Lim appeared for Jayshree, while federal counsel K Saravanan and Noorul Fhaiez Nayan appeared for the doctors and the government.