Critics of Rick Santorum recently derided the Republican presidential candidate for his allegedly hypocritical views on medical malpractice lawsuits, according to a report from ABC News.

Santorum, sources say, has frequently called for limits on the amount of damages injured people can seek in a medical malpractice lawsuit, but twelve years ago, his wife Karen sued her chiropractor for a half million dollars.

His wife’s lawsuit, which was filed after the chiropractor allegedly injured her back, claimed that the injury caused her pain and prevented her from being able to campaign for her politician husband.

Santorum claims that his wife is free to make her own choices (a very noble admission on his part), but he wasn’t a completely innocent bystander during the 1999 lawsuit, as sources say he testified in court to support her case.

According to ABC News, Karen Santorum alleged in her medical malpractice claim that Dr. David Dolberg started treating her for back pain soon after she lost her newborn son.

In her lawsuit, Santorum alleged that Dr. Dolberg made the issue worse by herniating one of the disks in her back, which eventually led her to have surgery to repair the tear.

After a trial, the jury awarded Karen Santorum a $350,000 personal injury settlement, although a court later reduced her total recovery to $175,000, still a very healthy sum.

The end of the trial brought a storm of criticism from observers on both the left and right sides of the political spectrum, although, predictably, the left seemed a bit more upset.

Democrats were especially upset because, while in the U.S. House, Santorum had sponsored a bill that would have limited plaintiffs in medical malpractice to just $250,000 in non-economic damages. Democrat strategic James Carville labeled Santorum a “world class hypocrite” for supporting his wife’s lawsuit seeking $500,000.

In his defense, Santorum claimed that he was always “going to support my wife in her endeavors,” but he qualified that remark by observing “[t]hat doesn’t necessarily mean that I agree with everything that she does.”

While Santorum certainly can’t be blamed for supporting his wife’s efforts to gain legal relief for her injuries, this story raises a common obstacle for people who wish to place caps on medical malpractice damages.

It’s much easier to support stern caps on malpractice lawsuits when the decision is made in a vacuum, but when a loved one suffers a debilitating injury due to negligent medical treatment, even the harshest critic recognizes the value of seeking adequate compensation.

Lindsay Lohan, a frequent contributor to news headlines across the country, made more news a few years ago for allegedly striking a nanny pushing a stroller across a Los Angeles road .Today, that incident may be coming back to haunt her.

The nanny in question, Nubia Del Carmen Preza, has filed a car accident lawsuit against Lohan, asking for an unspecified amount of damages for her injuries, according to a recent report from MTV.com.

The alleged accident happened back in September 2010, when Lohan allegedly ran a red light in West Hollywood, California, during which she struck Preza, who was pushing a stroller across the intersection when Lohan stormed through it.

Of course, this being Hollywood, a key witness to the accident was an aspiring paparazzi photographer, Brayan Jaime.

After the accident, Jaime told the website TMZ.com that the collision between Lohan’s car and Preza qualified as a “major hit.” He also told the website that the front bumper of Lohan’s sports car hit the nanny in the leg and lifted three of the stroller’s four wheels into the air.

Despite this alleged collision with the stroller, though, Jaime claimed that the child did not appear to be injured, but he did not offer any information on Preza’s condition after the incident.

Some enterprising reporter wisely asked Jaime why he didn’t call the police immediately after he saw the “major hit,” but the photographer claimed that he didn’t have a good reason. He admitted that he should have contacted authorities, but said he “didn’t want to get involved.”

After the incident, rumors circulated that Jaime and another member of the paparazzi had camera footage of the accident, but no news outlet had verified this claim. Of course, after Preza files the personal injury lawsuit, any video footage that exists may come to light.

At press time, sources did not offer any definitive word on whether Preza suffered long-term injuries after the crash.

Some observers are also skeptical about Preza’s claim because she waited for several months before filing the lawsuit, and she did not press criminal charges against Lohan at the time of the accident.

Courts usually eye lawsuits against wealthy celebrities with some degree of healthy skepticism, particularly if the lawsuit comes years after the alleged injury was suffered.

Nevertheless, the court will take the claim seriously, and won’t rush to judgment before all the facts are available. Lohan, who has been in and out of trouble for the last several years, is surely hoping that the facts are ultimately in her favor.

Giant drug maker Pfizer could soon face a deluge of defective drug lawsuits after the company’s embarrassing recall of more than one million birth control pills left thousands of female customers nervous about potential pregnancies.

The pills are advertised as offering almost 100 percent protection against pregnancy, but this rate of success is dependent on the customer taking the pills in the proper order.

To Pfizer’s chagrin, a recent shipment of birth control pills contained pills that were placed in each package in the wrong order, a terrible mistake that led to the massive recall, according to a report from CBS News.

Typically, women take 21 birth control pills with active pregnancy-preventing ingredients that are intermixed with seven placebo pills. The pills are typically color-coded and women are instructed to not to mix the placebo pills with the active pills.

In theory, if the pills are out of order, the company’ manufacturing error could lead some consumers to take the birth control pills in the wrong order, thereby raising their risk of getting an unwanted pregnancy.

Users of Pfizer’s products, however, should not be too alarmed. According to sources, the only drug that was affected was Lo/Ovral-28 and its generic equivalent, and the company estimates that only 30 packets of the drug were flawed.

So, even though the company believes only a handful of drugs were flawed, Pfizer took extreme caution in recalling more than one million birth control pills.

And, in more good news for consumers, the recalled drug is not a particularly popular form of birth control, as it ranks 64th in the country in total sales. The generic version of the drug, though, is ranked in the top 30, according to CBS News.

People who use Lo/Ovral-28 should immediately contact their doctors to learn what steps they need to take to get back on reliable birth control pills.

In addition, users of Lo/Ovral-28 who are curious about whether they can file a defective drug lawsuit against Pfizer must recognize one important thing: for a customer to file a tort claim against the company, she must be able to prove that she suffered an actual injury.

Of course, the actual injury need not be a pregnancy—the fear of pregnancy could suffice, but such a clam would likely be a shot in the dark. The limited number of actually defective products will likely limit the number of personal injury claims that Pfizer will have to face.

Nevertheless, if you use Lo/Ovral-28 and are concerned about the potential consequences of the drug, contact a local injury attorney today for more information about your legal options.

A woman from New Albany, Indiana recently won a $1.5 million judgment from a medical malpractice lawsuit that she filed after losing most of her intestines due to an allegedly negligent medical decision.

The woman, Michelle Wells Fischer, developed a permanently disabling disorder—a condition known as “short gut syndrome,” which is as ghastly as it sounds—after doctors removed most of her intestines during emergency surgery in 2003, according to a report from the News and Tribune.

The emergency surgery was necessary because the woman’s surgeon, Dr. William H. Garner, had postponed her scheduled surgery based on new medical information.

Fischer had originally seen Dr. Garner in June of 2003, complaining of severe abdominal pain. At the time, Fischer was an otherwise healthy 21-year-old who was working as a special education teacher.

At her first appointment, which occurred on a Friday, Dr. Garner allegedly recognized the need for surgery, but decided to delay it until the following Monday.

This decision, however, proved costly, as Fischer was taken to the hospital two days later and had to have emergency surgery to remove most of our intestines due to her development of ischemic bowel disease, also known as dead bowel.

Most humans have roughly 22 feet of small intestine, but Fischer’s emergency surgery left her with only a few feet of working intestine, which causes her to experience constant hunger and bloating.

In her personal injury claim, Fischer contended that she would have been able to keep much more of her intestines if she had been able to receive surgery on the day after she was diagnosed with the life-threatening condition.

Apparently, the delay may have allowed her condition to progress to the point where it compromised most of her stomach.
A jury in Clark County, Indiana agreed with Fischer’s version of the story, and issued a $1.5 million verdict that is believed to be the second largest jury verdict in the history of Clark County.

Despite this lofty sum, Fischer will only be able to receive about $1.25 from Dr. Garner (or, more specifically, his insurance company) due to Indiana medical malpractice laws that place a cap on damages in such claims.

Still, the money will go a long way towards paying for Fischer’s pain and suffering, although she will likely be racked with large medical bills for the rest of her life as she struggles to live in her compromised condition.