$23.1 Million Verdict After Radiologist Failed to Flag Spinal Cord Threat at Northern Light A.R. Gould Hospital

In December 2020, Robert Giordano of Madawaska, Maine, went to the emergency room at Northern Light A.R. Gould Hospital in Presque Isle after a fall. A CT scan was performed. That scan showed a large bony calcification pressing into his spinal canal, a finding that was visible on the imaging but never communicated to the clinical team. The radiologist did not flag it. The hospital's own internal policy for critical findings required immediate notification. No notification was made.

Over the next six weeks, Giordano returned to providers multiple times as his condition worsened. At one point, a primary care physician documented that he appeared to be malingering when he could no longer stand. No one connected the deterioration to the missed scan. On January 30, 2021, Giordano became fully paralyzed below the chest. He was airlifted by LifeFlight to Northern Light in Bangor, where an MRI confirmed the spinal cord compression. Surgery followed, but the damage was permanent.

Giordano has been paralyzed from the chest down since that date. He now requires a wheelchair, a non-invasive ventilator, and a feeding tube. His wife left her own work to become his full-time caregiver. He was 40 years old at the time of the incident.

Berman and Simmons attorney Travis Brennan tried the case in Aroostook County Superior Court in Caribou over nearly two weeks. The theory at trial was that the radiologist's failure to report the critical imaging finding violated the standard of care and the hospital's own protocols, and that timely intervention during the six-week window after the initial scan would have prevented the paralysis. The jury deliberated roughly three hours before returning a verdict of $23.1 million.

Northern Light Health disagreed with the verdict. No information on appeal was available at the time the verdict was reported. The award is reported as the largest non-death medical malpractice verdict in Maine history and the largest civil jury verdict ever recorded in Aroostook County.