$1.75 Million Verdict After ER Doctor Missed Aortic Dissection, Called It Muscle Strain

On the evening of August 18, 2014, Tom Rochfort, 65, went to the emergency room at the University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center in Towson after feeling chest pain during a workout. He had a significant cardiac history, including a prior aortic valve replacement that required ongoing anticoagulant therapy, and his chest X-ray showed cardiomegaly. Despite those findings, the treating physician, Dr. Ellen Lemkin of Osler Drive Emergency Physicians Associates, P.A., diagnosed him with a muscle strain and discharged him.

Rochfort had spent 41 years teaching science in Baltimore County public schools, retiring from Parkville High School in 2011. He was survived by his wife, two daughters, and four grandchildren.

Twenty-seven hours after that first visit, Rochfort returned to the emergency room by ambulance. This time, physicians found a large aortic dissection, a catastrophic tear in the inner wall of the aorta. He suffered cardiac arrest at the hospital. Emergency surgery was unsuccessful. He died six days after the original visit, on August 26, 2014.

The family retained James Cardea and Tara Clary of Schochor, Staton, Goldberg and Cardea, P.A. The central argument at trial was straightforward: a patient with Rochfort's cardiac profile should have received a CT scan during that first visit. According to Cardea, the CT scan would have revealed an early aortic dissection and allowed surgeons to intervene before the tear became lethal. An expert witness testified that timely intervention would have given Rochfort five to ten more years of life.

The defense, representing Dr. Lemkin and Osler Drive Emergency Physicians Associates, argued that Rochfort was properly diagnosed with a chest strain at the first visit and that the dissection developed after he left the ER. The jury rejected that position.

On June 25, 2019, after a trial that began June 17 in Baltimore County Circuit Court, the jury returned a plaintiff's verdict of $1,750,000. The damages included $1,000,000 for Rochfort's widow, $250,000 for the decedent's estate for pain and suffering, and $250,000 for each of his two surviving adult daughters.