PORTLAND — A woman who says she was sitting in a waiting room of OHSU Hospital when a light fixture fell on her head has filed a $250,000 lawsuit against the medical center.
Now, two years after the incident on Sept. 23, 2014, Amy Ritter is still plagued by the traumatic brain injury she suffered when she was knocked unconscious, according to her lawsuit filed earlier this month in Multnomah County Circuit Court.
Ritter has difficulty concentrating and balancing; headaches; pain in her neck, shoulders and back; altered depth perception and delayed reactions, her suit states.
An OHSU spokeswoman declined to talk about the case, stating: “Out of respect for the legal process and patient privacy laws, OHSU will not comment on this case.”
Ritter’s lawsuit contends that after she was struck by the light, she experienced a series of blunders by medical staff.
Her suit states that a nurse told her she was not to eat until all tests were run. The next day — about 30 hours after she’d last eaten — she told a doctor that she was hungry and the doctor responded by telling her she could eat and that the nurse’s instruction was wrong, according to the suit.
The suit also states that Ritter’s stress and pain were exacerbated by an inexperienced employee who tried to draw her blood but was unsuccessful the first few times. The suit states that the employee got lost in the hospital, trying to wheel her to her second CT scan.
Ritter’s suit states that several OHSU employees apologized to her for the fallen light fixture and that one said her treatment at the hospital would be free. But Ritter’s Portland attorney, Kevin Lafky, said OHSU still tried to charge her for some of her medical care, “despite promises by staff that they would not.”
Ritter had originally gone to the waiting room at OHSU Hospital to see a medical professional for “ongoing abdominal pain” that she had been experiencing, the suit states.
After she was struck by the light fixture, Ritter had to drop out of graduate classes at the University of Southern California because of her injuries, the suit says. She also worries that she will lose her job because she has trouble concentrating and has had to take lots of time off work to seek medical care, the suit says.
Ritter seeks as much as $50,000 for lost wages, medical expenses, out-of-pocket costs and money she lost dropping her college studies midcourse. She also seeks as much as $200,000 for her pain, suffering and decreased quality of life.
