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Disabled Woman Awarded Millions for Prescription that Caused Stroke

New Jersey Courier-Post
February 1, 2024

By Bernie Weisenfeld

Woodbury--

A Washington Township woman who suffered a stroke in 1996 after taking migraine medication has received a multimillion-dollar jury award against the prescribing physician.

Delores Guida, 49, will receive an undisclosed portion of the $4.5 million in damages a jusy awarded Friday at the end of a 10-day malpractice trial in Gloucester County.

Attorneys for Guida and the Wasington Township osteopathic physician, Herbert Fichman, reached a confidential agreement on damages before the jury's decision, said Guida's lawyer, Gayle Lewis of Cherry Hill.

Guida suffered a stroke and paralysis the day after she took migraine medication newly prescribed by Fichman and another migraine drug she had previously used. Interaction between the medications, Imitrex and Cafergot, was the apparent cause of Guida's stroke, Lewis said.

Neither Fichman nor his attorney, Jay Blumberg of Woodbury, returned phone calls seeking comment Wednesday.

The jury concluded Fichman and Guida were both negligent, assigning 68 percent of liability for damages to Fichman.

Most of the damages awareded by the jury -- $3.2 million -- were for future medical care. Lewis said Guida, who is married and has grown children, is totally disabled. She has regained slight movement on her left side and has limited ability to speak. Lewis called her "one of the bravest women I've ever met."

In lieu of testifying, Guida made a videotape about a year ago describing the day she received the prescription, Lewis said. The jury also saw a video of a typical day of Guida's life at home.

Your Own in the 21st Century

PaTLA
June, 1998

By: Gayle R. Lewis, Esq.

As I look back on my 50th birthday this past fall and begin to realize that next year will be my 25th practicing law, I am amazed further that in less than two years we will enter the 21st Century.

Despite the "computer glitch" that we hear will confront us on January 1, 2000, this next year and a half will be a test for solo or smaller office legal practitioners to rethink our priorities, stay competitive, remain profitable and sustain a high degree of freedom that is the driving force for our career paths.

The basic concerns that any young attorney has when opening his or her own office, are probably the same that I had 18 years ago; only now everything is more expensive. The good news is that technology is actually not as costly as you think, and truly inexpensive for what it can do for you. Think carefully, and then invest in a computerized office. It can do wonders for you.

Every machine is connected through a network. Your joint calendar, case management program, the Internet, e-mail, every "form," macros, and every file can be found on each machine. You can literally be anywhere and connect to your office with a new software package called P.C. Anywhere.

The latest technology is very affordable and not an enormous investment of money compared to the cost of connecting a 50-100--attorney firm, which may be to interconnect 250-300 people. Technology allows the small practitioner to compete in the legal marketplace, and win with comparatively smaller resources, and great savings of time and energy. Of course, you still need brains, enthusiasm, a dedicated staff with strong communication skills, and a good relationship with a banker for your line of credit, which is also essential to keep the flow of cash in tight times.

While you may need to "high tech" your office to the "nines," "overhead" is something you need to keep as low as possible. Find ways to conserve and combine certain resources with other small or solo practices. I.e. maintain a library on CD-ROM. Share the highest technology and a reasonable overhead, you still need the most important element, clients.

Getting the clients to come through your door is almost always never spoken about in law school. Here are some tried and true ways to interest people in your services. It goes without saying that you need to be seen, heard, and active. Volunteer, coach, take up sports, be community minded, join clubs, lecture, write, and socialize a lot.

Some people, while they are not the classic "extroverts" and "social animals" find that they are comfortable in the context of a bar association of trial bar activity. Your local bar association can also be a training ground to improve your public speaking, networking and writing skills. Contacts are very important to boost your professional career. Everyone tries to be unique. Not all of us can be, but you can attempt to carve out a "niche" for yourself. Specialization is really the way, with a small law firm. No one can do everything, but it is possible to do one thing well. The more unique your specialty is, the easier it is to convince people to go with you.

Lastly, you need to always be your own publicist. Don't leave a conversation without mentioning something new, interesting, and exciting that is going on in your professional life. Mention your last encounter in court, your last win, or an interesting legal argument you won. Announce your victories; publicize your wins. Everyone loves a winner.

Be creative. Write articles, publish a newsletter and send in person announcements to legal magazines and general circulation newspapers concerning lectures and articles. Purchase public information material from trade organizations, PaTLA and other associations and stamp your address on it. Don't forget clients' birthdays and holidays to send out cards and public service letters on insurance, auto reform, new legislation, etc. Do what many lawyers forget to do - communicate with your clients on a regular basis and return all phone calls within 24 hours.

At the time of any settlement if you do personal injury, etc., make sure you hang out extra cards and tell your clients to recommend you to their friends and tell them what a good lawyer you are, and give out your card. Thank them for their assistance. Remember, walk the walk and talk the talk, and your next 25 years will go as fast as my first 25.

Remember, the year 2000 --- it's right around the corner.

Practice limited to medical negligence, serious injuries from defective products/accidents

Profiles
March 22, 2024

She's experienced it from two sides, rising through the ranks of one of the last "old boy's clubs," and defending women, children, and the elderly maltreated by a thoughtless, at times callous medical community.

"It's the way society is set up, the values it places on women and children," explained attorney Gayle R. Lewis. "Their complaints are often not heard. The legal community is only a reflection of society at large.

"I am very sensitive to the care that women and children receive." It's her sub-specialty: birth injuries, OB/GYN complaints, even the failure to diagnose breast cancer.

"Women use health services three times more frequently than men," Lewis said. "Older people are often forced into the health care system because of a problem. But often they are not taken seriously. They need advocates."

Gayle Lewis is a specialist in medical negligence and catastrophic accidents, and a solo practitioner since 1981. When you hire Gayle, you get Gayle, not an untried legal associate.

It's how Lewis has fostered the many long-term relationships of her client base. "It's through accessibility and honest and open communications," she said.

"I keep my clients informed and current on all phases of their litigation, as well as to the legal consequences of the decisions that happen regarding their claim."

In a large firm, a client is often shuffled among the partnership's aides and support staff.

"You may see the managing partner once in the first day of your case," Lewis said, "then the others, many inexperienced, will come and go. I don't come and go, I'm there from the beginning to the end."

To maintain her philosophy, Lewis accepts a limited number of cases. "This is not a legal mill," she said. "I offer a personalized, professional relationship."

You also get Lewis's wealth of experience. Upon finishing law school, Lewis became an assistant attorney general in the Pennsylvania Department of Insurance, where she specialized in health care and health insurance.

She them became a special assistant to the state Insurance Commissioner.

"In this position, I saw how injured persons can get lost in the legal shuffle, between lawyers and the court system," she said. "I wanted to help them. "I had made the broad strokes, molding regulations for newborns, and other health care consumers, but I wanted to help individuals."

She then became a deputy administrator with the Arbitration Panels for Health Care.

"We would review and adjudicate all medical malpractice claims file in Pennsylvania," Lewis said.

Lewis has published a number of local articles on her expertise, served six years on the board of trial lawyers, and in June will offer a lecture for the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers on the challenges facing women litigators.

If you would like a personal consultation, call Gayle, at 496-9342. Her office is at 2000 Market Street, suite 1805. She also has an office in Cherry Hill, NJ, at 1040 Kings Highway, 609-482-0033.

Breast Implant Litigation: Past, Present and Future

Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association: VERDICT, March 1992:

By: Gayle R. Lewis, Esquire

In my litigating of breast implant cases, through the collecting of documents in the various discovery stages, I have been shocked by the little regard that the manufacturers and health care providers have shown for the safety of women's bodies in their rush to make "big bucks" in this very lucrative cosmetic market.

I look back to the 60's and early 70's, to those days we called the "sexual revolution," where every female in law school irrespective of her political and social philosophy, was called a "women's libber". These were the days when all of us looked hopefully to the next years, when we would be professionals in our respective legal fields doing the job that male lawyers had historically been doing without female lawyers. I can see that, yes, we as woman lawyers have made great strides, but there is always a cost. The price to women has been high.

The sexual revolution of the 60's and the availability of birth control pills appeared to promise for women a new found freedom. We could control the destiny of our own bodies. Certainly this was the issue for centuries. The came the new "high estrogen" birth control pills, which were to be the vehicle to allow we women to make choices in our lives, assert greater control on our respective organs and greater freedom over our own bodies. Did we have any idea that the "pill" was rushed to market hastily without adequate testing? Later, it would be revealed that there were serious risks of disease and consequences in its use.

The IUDs in the 60's and 70's specifically, the Dalkon Shield was also promised to be "the safest and most effective birth control method ever." Once again, we liberated females could pursue the equality we sought in our personal and professional lives. Were we told that the "tail" of the Dalkon Shield was a "wick" for infection, that could expose our organs to pelvic inflammatory disease, sterility, etc.?

What about the wonder drug diethylstilbestrol (DES), a synthetic estrogen, prescribed to prevent miscarriage in the 50's and 60's. Did we know of the great risk of cervical cancer to ourselves and our unborn fetuses? The list of horrors grew; stroke, heart disease, cancer, pelvic inflammatory disease, hysterectomy, infertility.

In the 80's we have seen the sexual revolution become an era of the sexually transmitted disease (STD). These diseases include gonorrhea, syphilis, chlamydia, herpes, papilloma warts, cancerous sexual warts, and AIDS. In the 90's we were once again confronted with yet another controversy; the silicone filed breast implants. The question is whether they should still be available to any women, despite growing concerns over their safety. Should these silicone breast implants only be available to women with mastectomy? What about the risks of connective tissue disease, scleroderma, Lupus, etc. Reading the newspaper commentary, listening to the hearings, being actively involved in the litigation of breast implant cases, once again, I am appalled that the safety of the silicone breast implants today remains unproven. Silicone breast implants have been used in breast augmentations on millions of women in this country and the possibility of rupture is great. There is no test that can clearly discern a rupture except the possibility in some instances of mammography and/or ultrasound.

I have no clear cut answers as to why there were no definitive studies done on the efficacy and safety of breast implants these 25 years. Have we as women been sacrificed again? I sadly feel the answer comes very close to "Caveat Emptor," let the buyer beware, a 19th century principle. As we approach the 21st century, the invisible thread that I see is that women continue to be sacrificed in the never ending search for our sexual freedom.

As long as women human beings continue to look for answers outside of ourselves to unique questions of personal identity, we will always be prey to companies/manufacturers who are known to fashion for the marketplace any item regardless of its apparent known or suspected risks and dangers to the consumer.

The FDA is still "vacillating" in its refusal to ban silicon implants. Government does not appear to hold out any meaningful answer now or ever.

The consequences that stem from indecisive government regulation and over aggressive avaricious manufacturing concerns, results in continuing victimization of women. These are the legal claims of tomorrow. Not much has changed these past 20 years, has it?

Cancer Patient, family to get $1M

The Record
October 18, 2024

By: Patricia Alex

Fourteen months after a Montclair doctor told her not to worry about the lumps on her right breast, Carol Geyer of Clifton learned that she had advanced breast cancer.

Mrs. Geyer, a 35-year-old mother of three young children, told Dr. Richard DiMarsico about the lumps in April 1985, shortly before the birth of her daughter. She said DeMarsico, of the Greater Montclair OB/GYN group in Montclair, did not order any testing or follow-up, telling her not to worry about the lumps.

Fourteen months later, Mrs. Geyer and her husband, Glenn, agreed to accept a settlement of nearly $1 million to end their civil lawsuit against the doctors in Superior Court in Paterson.

In agreeing to the settlement, DeMarsico and Dr. Gary DeGrande, an associate who had examined Mrs. Geyer, did not admit liability or responsibility in the case. The settlement has proved of little solace to the Geyers and their three children, ages 3, 6, and 7.

"We hope the doctors think about it," said Geyer. "Hopefully it will help other women. I just wish there was some other way they could get the information."

The Geyers together were awarded $375,000. Additionally, Geyer will receive monthly payments of $500 for the next 25 years. Each of the couple's three children will receive between $20,000 and $25,000 for each of the four years after they reach college age. Further, six payments totaling $195,000 will be paid to Geyer between 1993 and 2018.

Mrs. Geyer said she worries that the payments to her husband will fall short of the child-care costs. "It sounds large, but you have to consider the costs," she said of the settlement.

The family did not want to risk a lengthy appeal by the doctors by not accepting the settlement.

Mrs. Geyer said she is worried about her family and at the same time hopeful that she will beat the odds. "I have to be hopeful; I have three children," she said. "If there's a 2 percent chance, I hope."

Still, she is angry. "It's infuriating," she said. "I'm convinced early detection would have helped."

The settlement was reached after several days of testimony in which Mrs. Geyers attorneys presented expert witnesses to describe her condition.

Dr. John H. Glick, director of the University of Pennsylvania Cancer Center, testified that Mrs. Geyer's cancer was incurable and her life expectancy limited.

Contradicting the stance of the Montclair doctors, Glick said an earlier diagnosis would have given Mrs. Geyer a "significantly improved" chance of survival. DeMarsico and DeGrande have contended that earlier detection would have made little difference.

A settlement was reached before the testimony was completed. Videotaped testimony from Mrs. Geyer, who was too ill to appear in court, was scheduled to be shown next.

The attorney for DeMarsico and DeGrande did not return a phone call.