£4.5 million in compensation for paralysed TV Reporter abandoned by neurosurgeon just hours after surgery
Andrew Brown, a former CNN report, has settled his claim against consultant neurosurgeon David Sandeman in the sum of ₤4.5 million in compensation plus Brown’s legal costs.
Brown had an operation in January 2006 to remove a tumour from his spinal cord. The operation took place at The Bath Clinic in the west of England.
Two days after completing the operation, the surgeon left the clinic to go on a business trip without arranging any cover for his patient.
Before Sandeman left The Bath Clinic on January 26, Brown had been complaining of severe pain in his neck.
20 minutes after the surgeon left the clinic, a junior doctor telephoned him to tell him that Brown could no longer feel his hands and feet.
Yet Sandeman, an NHS Consultant at Frenchay Hospital in Bristol with 23 years’ experience under his belt as a neurosurgeon, went ahead with his journey and could not be contacted by mobile or otherwise for the next 3 and a half hours.
In the meantime a blood clot that had formed between Brown’s spinal cord and his vertebrae expanded, crushing critical nerve pathways and at 3.40 pm he was quadriplegic. He spent the next 8 weeks in intensive care unable to breathe on his own and almost totally paralysed below the neck.
Andrew Brown, who was born on January 19 1964 and brought up in the Guildford area, has spent most of his professional life in Hong Kong where he has worked as a correspondent for CNN, the business TV network CNBC, several local TV stations and CBS Radio. He covered news in Hong Kong, mainland China and Southeast Asia from 1989 - 2005.
After being discharged from intensive care at Frenchay Hospital outside Bristol, Brown was treated at an NHS spinal cord injuries unit in Salisbury.
Today Brown is confined to a wheelchair although he can walk short distances with crutches. He suffers from chronic neuropathic pain which makes it impossible for him to lead a normal life.
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