Great Moments In Medicine

From the New York Daily News: A California grandfather was left brain damaged after a cardiologist allegedly left a gaping hole in his chest following open heart surgery so that he could attend a luncheon.
Dr. Pervaiz Chaudhry, of Valley Cardiac Surgery in Fresno, Calif., apparently relied on an unqualified assistant to stitch up 72-year-old Silvino Perez's chest on April 2, 2012, according to the State Department of Health.
The patient's heart stopped as oxygen escaped his body and he was placed on life support, reported local station KFSN-TV. Perez, who loves gardening and his grandchildren, has been in a vegetative state since that surgical slip-up two years ago.
"I just want people to know what kind of doctor he is," his stepson, Cristobal Arteaga, told ABC News. "You go in there and you trust this individual with your life ... The fact that he would do this to an individual — one individual — is too much."

Perez's wife, Maria A. Arteaga Alvarez, and Cristobal Arteaga, filed a lawsuit Dec. 23, claiming they learned of the alleged operating room absence from an anonymous caller on Oct. 26, reported the Merced Sun-Star.

The daily paper said that state investigators, similarly, were tipped off by an anonymous call on April 11, 2012. They launched an investigation and discovered that the doctor violated hospital rules and regulations that prohibit the primary surgeon to leave an operating room before the patient is returned to stable condition.
After the incident, Chaudhry reportedly raced back to the operating room to manually massage Perez's heart — but the damage was already done.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/patient-brain-damaged-doctor-lunch-suit-article-1.1582337#ixzz2qdX1zzjM
Hey, when you have a Big Mac attack, you just have to leave and satisfy your hunger.