Anesthesia Errors

Anesthesia Errors in Kirkland

Find Answers in the Anesthesia Record & Timeline

Anesthesia affects breathing, blood pressure, heart function, consciousness, and oxygen delivery. When unexpected harm occurs, patients and families may be left wondering whether it was an unavoidable complication or a preventable error. Answering that question requires a close review of the medication given, airway management, vital-sign monitoring, and the response to changing conditions.

Not every complication amounts to medical negligence. A viable claim generally requires evidence that a health care provider failed to meet the accepted standard of care and that the failure caused an injury. Detailed records and the timing of events can help distinguish a known complication from a preventable anesthesia error.

Ask our attorneys to review your concerns. Call (425) 657-5255 to discuss an anesthesia-related injury affecting you or your family.

A Patient Perspective Shaped by 12 Surgeries

Attorney Robert Kornfeld has undergone 12 surgeries following serious injuries. That experience shapes how we work with patients and families facing uncertainty, additional treatment, and a difficult recovery after a medical procedure.

We handle personal injury and medical malpractice cases for clients in Kirkland, Bellevue, Seattle, and throughout Washington. We bring more than 40 years of Washington personal injury litigation experience and have recovered more than $35 million in settlements and verdicts for injured clients.

Where Anesthesia Care Can Break Down

Potential failures can occur before anesthesia begins, during its administration, or in recovery. The central question is whether providers made and carried out decisions consistent with the patient’s condition and the accepted standard of care.

Issues that may require further investigation include:

Pre-procedure assessment: Failing to identify allergies, medication interactions, respiratory or cardiac risks, relevant medical history, or contraindications.
Medication administration: Giving the wrong drug or an incorrect dosage for the patient’s needs and condition.
Airway management: Mishandling intubation, including the placement of a breathing tube, or failing to respond to inadequate oxygen delivery.
Patient monitoring: Missing changes in oxygen saturation, blood pressure, heart function, breathing, or other vital signs.
Communication: Failing to relay allergies, medications, health conditions, or significant changes among the anesthesia team, surgical staff, and nurses.
Recovery care: Delaying recognition of respiratory distress or failing to respond to complications after the procedure.

Anesthesia awareness occurs when a patient becomes conscious during general anesthesia. Although the event alone doesn’t establish negligence, the records may reveal whether medication, equipment, monitoring, or response decisions contributed to it.

What Washington Medical Negligence Law Requires

Under RCW 7.70.040, a claimant must generally prove that a provider failed to use the care, skill, and learning expected of a reasonably prudent provider in the same or similar circumstances. The claimant must also establish proximate cause: a sufficiently direct connection between that failure and the injury.

Expert medical testimony is often important because a qualified medical professional may need to explain the applicable standard of care and whether the alleged failure caused the harm. Depending on the facts, recoverable damages may include additional treatment, rehabilitation, disability, lost income, emotional harm, long-term care, or losses arising from wrongful death.

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Our Proven Results

Our top priority is to devise customized legal strategies that are tailored to the unique legal needs of our clients, no matter how simple or complicated their situations, might be.

$235,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
A client who had pre-existing anxiety was in two car crashes in 2015 and 2018 and suffered a concussion and spinal injuries in the first with increase in his PTSD and anxiety. He was improving and then was in a second MVA and suffered an aggravation and worsening of the PTSD and anxiety from the first MVA and has not returned to baseline. We were successful in recovering $235,000 for him from both drivers’ insurance and his own underinsured motorist insurance.

Car Accident
$275,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
Our client received a $275,000 third-party settlement after he was rear-ended and recruited our firm. The accident took a toll on our client’s spine and abdomen. He suffered a cervical strain, right trapezius strain, chest wall contusion, and abdominal wall contusion. Our client also sprained his left foot and ankle, sustained A.C. arthrosis and degenerative labral tears, and suffered mild chronic rotator cuff tendinosis.

Car Accident
$50,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
Plaintiff was riding a motorcycle when the Defendant pulled out in front of him. Plaintiff was thrown from his motorcycle. Plaintiff sustained fractured carpal bones, torn acetabular labrum and bone contusion, pain in the pelvic region and thigh, pain in the forearm and low back pain.

Car Accident
$100,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
One of our clients sustained serious injuries after a negligent driver blew passed a red light in Shoreline, causing a T-bone collision with the client’s vehicle.

Car Accident
$22,763 Motor Vehicle Accident
Plaintiff was rear-ended and the Defendant was arrested for DUI. Plaintiff sustained a L5-S1 central disc protrusion and annular tear as well as neck and other back injuries and headaches. She has not fully recovered and continues to experience pain that is aggravated by day to day activities.

Car Accident
$500,000 Construction Accident
Client was injured on the job and required a knee replacement, received $500,000 in compensation.

Construction Accident
$4,000,000 Wrongful Death
Our client was killed execution-style by a police officer with a history of brutality. Video footage and experts showed that our client did nothing to provoke the officer’s violence.

Personal Injury
$5,200,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
We recovered $5.2 Million from the government for a woman who sustained a spine injury in a motor vehicle accident due to an unsafe and defective highway design.
$750,000 Medical Malpractice
The Estate of Jane Doe v. Dr . Anesthesiologist: A patient with obvious facial and neck deformities went in for a routine D & C. Because the patient was overly sedated, the doctor was unable to timely awaken the patient from the paralytic drugs after she was unable to intubate and establish an airway in a timely fashion. As a result, the patient suffered severe hypoxia and brain damage and died one week later.

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Anesthesia Injury Reviews for Kirkland-Area Patients

Patients may receive anesthesia in hospitals, surgical centers, clinics, and other treatment facilities. Local care settings include EvergreenHealth Medical Center and Overlake Medical Center in Bellevue. We identify them only as facilities where patients may receive care, not as business partners or responsible parties in any particular case.

What matters is where the treatment occurred, not where our firm is physically based. We handle cases involving care provided in Kirkland, Bellevue, Seattle, and other Washington communities.

Records We Examine in an Anesthesia Error Investigation

We review available records and the circumstances surrounding a complication to assess whether the care appears consistent with Washington standards. An anesthesia malpractice investigation typically focuses on reconstructing the decisions made before, during, and immediately after the procedure.

A legal and medical review may examine:

Anesthesia and medication administration records
Vital-sign monitoring and oxygen data
Surgical and nursing documentation
Recovery room records
Laboratory results, imaging, and follow-up treatment
Communications among anesthesia providers, surgeons, nurses, and facility staff

Together, these materials may show what changed, who was monitoring the patient, how providers responded, and whether the event contributed to the claimed injury. Medical opinions may then be necessary to evaluate the standard of care and causation.

Who May Be Responsible for an Anesthesia Injury?

Responsibility depends on who participated in the patient’s care, the roles assigned to each person, and the sequence of events. Depending on the facts, a claim may involve an anesthesiologist, nurse anesthetist, surgeon, nursing staff, hospital, clinic, or another health care entity. The injury alone doesn’t identify the legally responsible party.

Some cases center on an individual clinical decision, such as drug selection or airway management. Others raise facility-level questions about staffing, communication, monitoring systems, or safety procedures. We examine the records before reaching conclusions about which people or organizations may bear responsibility.

Time Limits for Washington Medical Negligence Claims

Washington law imposes time limits on professional negligence actions. RCW 4.16.350 includes provisions tied to when the act occurred and when the patient discovered, or reasonably should have discovered, the cause of the injury.

Exceptions and tolling rules can change that calculation, including provisions involving concealment and foreign objects. Ongoing treatment, a delayed diagnosis, or uncertainty about what happened doesn’t make it safe to wait. A prompt legal review can clarify which rules may apply to the specific circumstances.

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Discuss a Possible Anesthesia Error in a Free Consultation

Contact us with any information you have, such as the procedure date, facility, known complications, ongoing injuries, and available records. A free consultation allows you to explain what happened and learn whether further investigation may be appropriate.

We can arrange consultations at convenient locations when an injury or ongoing treatment makes travel difficult. You won’t owe attorney fees unless we recover compensation for you.

Call (425) 657-5255 to speak with Lindquist & Kornfeld about your concerns and possible next steps.

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