The TSJC confirms the conviction of the Canary Islands Health Service for the death of a nurse

The High Court of Justice of the Canary Islands (TSJC) has confirmed a conviction against the Canary Islands Health Service (SCS) for the death of a 51-year-old nurse at the Doctor Negrín Hospital in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria with four liters of fluid in her pleural cavities, and imposes an indemnity totaling more than 745,000 euros.

The ruling sent by the law firm Henríquez y Carnero Abogados, responsible for the legal defense of the plaintiffs, is based on the doctrine of "disproportionate damage" to justify its decision, as the circumstances in which the death occurred were incompatible with the expected clinical evolution.

In this regard, it reasons that the treatment or surgical technique used in this case failed without healthcare professionals being able to provide a sound alternative hypothesis of what happened.

The victim, a 51-year-old woman with Crohn's disease, underwent surgery at the aforementioned public hospital in January 2022 and, as part of the treatment, a peripherally inserted central venous catheter was implanted to administer parenteral nutrition.

Although this treatment ended up causing an injury that resulted in the administered nutrition accumulating in the patient's pleural cavities, which caused her progressive asphyxiation, as concluded by the ruling, which has become final.

The TSJC reasons that, in the face of the evidence presented by the victim's family, with "forceful" expert reports, the administration has presented its conclusions in reports documented in clinical notes.

And it has insisted that the administration, in its appeal, still does not sufficiently prove the causes of the damage and has not rationally explained why the patient died, whether from the accumulation of lymph or parenteral nutrition.

"We cannot accept as an explanation that the doctors themselves do not explain it", the judicial resolution has concluded.

It is for all these reasons that it confirms a principal indemnity of 659,387 euros, in addition to the legal interest accrued since the administrative claim filed by the family on January 18, 2023, which brings the total amount to be received to over 745,000 euros.

In its appeal, the administration warned of an erroneous assessment of the evidence in the first-instance ruling issued by Court Number 5 of the Court of Instance of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Contentious-Administrative) when it stated that there is no laboratory evidence of the fluid in the lungs to determine if it was lymph or parenteral nutrition.

According to Canary Islands health authorities, a biochemical analysis of the fluid extracted from the patient was carried out, which would scientifically demonstrate that it is indeed lymph.

But the TSJC understands that, even if there was an error in the ruling, it would be "irrelevant" in any case, since the conviction is for disproportionate damage.

In any case, the ruling, whose rapporteur was magistrate Inmaculada Rodríguez Falcón, considers that the ground for appeal "is not entirely accurate," since the biochemical analysis is only documented through a clinical note from the on-call doctors, which cannot be considered a report as such.