Malaysia: The Malaysian government has been ordered to pay the widow of a lawyer 2 million ringgits, or RM ($461,893) in damages in a medical negligence case involving radiofrequency ablation, according to a report published by the New Straits Times. The case involved Jayshree LC Doshi, the widow of former Asian International Arbitration Centre Director Vinayak Pradhan. The defendants included a National Cancer Institute (NCI) radiologist and a Kuala Lumpur Hospital plastic surgeon. High Court Judge Datuk Akhtar Tahir found the radiologist liable but dismissed the suit against the plastic surgeon, the article states. The names of both defendants were not given in the article.
New Straits Times also reported that Tahir ordered the government to pay Doshi 800,000 RM ($184,757) for pain and suffering, 700,000 RM ($161,662) in special damages, and 500,000 RM ($115,473) in aggravated damages. Additionally, the government will pay Doshi 250,000 RM ($57,736) in costs. However, Doshi was ordered to pay 30,000 RM ($6,928) in costs for the dismissed suit against the plastic surgeon and the government. Akhtar said aggravated damages were awarded as the radiologist exhibited a “lackadaisical attitude” and did not show
compassion after being informed of burns suffered by Pradhan when the latter suffered burns from a radiofrequency ablation procedure for a thymic neuroendocrine tumor. The article states that Pradhan was left bedridden and in “excruciating pain.”
While cryoablation was the first procedure decided on to treat the tumor, the radiologist decided to perform radiofrequency ablation instead without informing Pradhan or Doshi of the cryoablation option. The article states that Doshi only found out about this from a medical report she received in 2020 after Pradhan’s death and that the radiologist told the couple that the radiofrequency ablation procedure carried minimal risk.