Coles County Jury Awards $14 Million After Hospital Missed Spinal Abscess Three Times

In September 2012, Mark Allen felt a pop in his neck while moving boxes. He was, by all accounts, a healthy man. Over the next six days he returned to the Sarah Bush Lincoln Health Center emergency department three times, each time with worsening symptoms: neck pain, fever, tingling, and burning sensations spreading through his limbs.

On his third visit, September 26, a CT scan was ordered. The radiologist read it as normal and Allen was sent home with a diagnosis of viral infection. The next day he collapsed. He was transferred to Carle Hospital, where an MRI revealed what the CT had missed: a spinal epidural abscess pressing on his spinal cord. Emergency surgery followed, but the damage was done. Allen was left with permanent neurological injuries.

Phillips Law Offices attorneys Stephen D. Phillips, Stephen J. Phillips, Terrence M. Quinn, and Michael R. Bertucci took the case to trial in December 2019 in Coles County Circuit Court. The theory was straightforward: three visits with red-flag symptoms, one misread scan, and no follow-up imaging. The jury agreed. It returned a verdict of $14 million, itemized as $4 million for pain and suffering, $4 million for disability, $3.8 million for future medical care, $2 million for emotional distress, with the balance covering lost income and disfigurement.

Sarah Bush Lincoln appealed, challenging the jury instructions on apparent agency, the qualifications of the plaintiff's expert witnesses, and alleged misconduct by plaintiff's counsel. The Illinois Appellate Court, Fourth District, rejected all three arguments in its May 28, 2021 opinion. The court found the jury instruction proper, the expert testimony admissible, and the misconduct claims forfeited because the hospital's trial attorneys had not objected in time. The $14 million verdict was affirmed in full.

Local coverage described the award as one of the largest damage amounts ever returned in a Coles County civil trial.