Melissa Rivers has filed suit against Yorkville Endoscopy, the New York City clinic where her mother Joan Rivers went in for an ultimately fatal surgery in August 2014. According to the New York Daily News, staff took cell phone pictures of Rivers while her vital signs plummeted over the course of 17 minutes.Melissa Rivers has filed the multi-million dollar lawsuit in the Manhattan Supreme Court against the clinic, two doctors and three anesthesiologists, claiming gross negligence and medical malpractice, the Daily News reports. When a routine procedure on the comedian’s throat caused a spasm and deprived her brain of oxygen, doctors ignored the acting anesthesiologist and proceeded with the surgery. Rivers then went into cardiac arrest. She left the clinic in a coma and died after seven days on September 4. The New York Times has a breakdown of the clinic’s numerous violations here.Melissa Rivers gave a statement to Us Weekly about her lawsuit:
“Filing this lawsuit was one of the most difficult decisions I’ve ever had to make. What ultimately guided me was my unwavering belief that no family should ever have to go through what my mother, [my son] Cooper and I have been through. The level of medical mismanagement, incompetency, disrespect and outrageous behavior is shocking and frankly, almost incomprehensible. Not only did my mother deserve better, every patient deserves better. It is my goal to make sure that this kind of horrific medical treatment never happens to anyone again.”
As one family lawyer Jeffrey Bloom, of Gair, Gair, Conason, Steigman McKauf, Bloom and Rabinowitz told the Daily News, “Had the doctors acted as physicians for Joan Rivers instead of groupies, Joan Rivers would have been doing ‘Fashion Police’ last week.”Related Articles:Straight Talk About Cosmetic Surgery
