As reported by Reuters May 25, 2007

U.S. researchers reported that children with cancer often get the wrong dose of chemotherapy or are given the drug at the wrong time, and many require treatment because of the errors.

It appears that most problems stem from the lack of a common dosing standard based on weight and age especially when chemo drugs are involved, because is no normal dose. 

“No studies have determined whether medication errors affect children on chemotherapy more than adults on chemotherapy, but studies have shown that 6% of all hospital-based medication errors occur in children” according to Dr. Marlene Miller, director of quality and safety at John Hopkins Children’s Center in Baltimore, Maryland. 

Mesothelioma is a signature disease for asbestos exposure.  In other words, exposure to asbestos is the only generally accepted cause for mesothelioma.  Further, it is generally accepted that mesothelioma is a low dose disease, with no known threshold of asbestos exposure below which there is no risk.  Stated another way, there is no safe level of exposure.      

Cappolino, Dodd, & Krebs were successful in their appeal of a defense verdict and take-nothing judgment in a medical malpractice/health care liability action.  Appellant Pass raised two voir dire issues, and the 10th Court of Appeals reversed and remand the case back to the trial court. 

Voir dire is the process by which each side’s attorney speaks with prospective jurors to basically disqualify or rehabilitate juror bias or prejudice, and after this process a jury is seated.  The Texas Supreme Court explained in the Vasquez, 189 S.W. 3d at 749 that voir dire, “Voir dire examination protects the right to an impartial jury by exposing possible improper juror biases that form the basis for statutory disqualification.  Thus, the primary purpose of voir dire is to inquire about specific views that would prevent or substantially impair jurors from performing their duty in accordance with their instructions and oath.”  Bias is defined as an inclination toward one side of an issue rather than to the other; disqualifying bias exists when it appears that the state of mind of the juror leads to the natural inference that he will not act with impartiality.  Prejudice means having made a prejudgment of or about the case.          

Case law establishes if a juror’s bias or prejudice is established as a matter of law, the trial court must disqualify the juror.

The issues raised by Appellant concerned proximate cause and the Plaintiff’s burden of proof.  The 10th Court of Appeals agreed with Appellant that venire person #5 was disqualified as a matter of law because of his inability to follow the court’s instruction regarding the law — the Plaintiff’s preponderance-of-the-evidence burden for proving medical negligence.   

Let’s hope that the Texas Supreme Court affirms the 10th Court of Appeals.