Ausley v. Johnston

450 S.W.2d 351, 1970 Tex. App. LEXIS 2451
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJanuary 21, 1970
Docket6055
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 450 S.W.2d 351 (Ausley v. Johnston) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ausley v. Johnston, 450 S.W.2d 351, 1970 Tex. App. LEXIS 2451 (Tex. Ct. App. 1970).

Opinion

OPINION

FRASER, Chief Justice.

This is a medical malpractice case in which appellant, Joan Ausley, as plaintiff below, sued appellee, as defendant below, asking to recover damages to appellant as the result of incorrect diagnosis, negligence and incorrect treatment by the appellee.

Appellant claims that appellee failed to examine, diagnose and treat her in accordance with the standards of practice of physicians of his specialty in Midland, Midland County, • Texas, and similar communities. The case was tried before a jury and the trial court’s judgment is based upon jury findings that judgment should be entered in favor of appellee on every claim asserted by the appellant in the lawsuit; in other words, the judgment was that appellant take nothing.

It appears that appellant, in June of 1965, was involved by a condition which she thought “was, basically, a bladder infection”. She went to her long-time Midland internal medicine specialist, Dr. Vincent E. Friedewald. According to the record, she, at that time, was having “burning frequencies and severe pain in the lower part of my stomach and back.” After a urinalysis made at the time “didn’t show much”, urinary antiseptics were prescribed along with antibiotics which were orally administered in tablet form. Further consultation and treatment with and by Dr. Friedewald, according to appellant, did not do her any good. Dr. Friedewald’s urinary tests indicated that she had an essentially normal urine at that time. On June 8th, appellant continued making the same complaint, and Dr. Friedewald thereafter referred her to appellee. Appellee became acquainted with appellant on June 15, 1965 at which time sh'e described her condition to appellee and gave him background information including the health of her parents. Appellee prescribed a drug known as “Gantanol” which was calculated to soothe and relax the bladder, and appellant was instructed to call appellee within two days to let him know how she was doing. She called the following day, and on the evening of June 16th went into the hospital. While in the hospital Dr. Carl Ambler, a hospital radiologist, began the first of a number of procedures necessary for an intravenous pyelo-gram. Appellant was then given a general anesthetic, and while she was asleep ap-pellee performed a systoscopy and uroscopy examination. The record shows that ap-pellee used an instrument to examine the urinary passage of appellant to the urethra from the bladder to the outside, and made other examinations and performed other procedures. Without going into a long and tedious recitation of the testimony of the doctors involved, we will sum up by saying that appellee thought that his June 17th examination of appellant disclosed a condition called interstitial cystitis (Hun-ner’s Ulcer). Appellee thought that this condition accounted for the complaints that appellant was making, and his work with appellant thereafter was designed to cut down her pain and discomfort and relax her bladder. Appellee states that he was certain that while appellant was in the hospital, he, while in her hospital room, discussed with her the result of the examination, and testified that he attempted to explain to her in lay terms about the hydro-nephrosis that he had found (hydronephro-sis, according to prior medical testimony, in this case was a mild hydronephrosis on the left side of the kidney, which meant a slight swelling in the left kidney and ureter.). Appellant remained in the hospital until Sunday, June 20th. Following her release she went to Dr. Johnston probably two or three times. After these visits appellant had “no consultations with or professional advice from” appellee, “nor had he seen her professionally after July 28, 1965”. During the 44-day period that appellant *354 was under the care of appellee, appellee left town on a two-week vacation. During his absence appellant continued to be in pain and consulted another doctor specializing in urology, who advised her to return to appellee for treatment.

On July 28th appellant was catheterized and the urine specimens thus obtained were analyzed and disclosed that appellant’s then condition was “essentially normal” and that her then condition was “considered normal”. At this last visit appellee gave her a new trial medication called “Enerax 10”, which was calculated to help relax the bladder and cut down on bladder discomfort and frequency which, broadly, had been part of the symptoms all along. Ap-pellee states that he did not dismiss appellant on July 28th, but believed that she would let him know one way or the other whether her condition had improved after taking the Enerax trial medication.

After her disassociation on July 28th, appellant returned to her family doctor who placed her back in the hospital where, on September 7th, still another doctor specializing in urology was consulted. After performing additional diagnostic work, Mrs. Ausley, the appellant, underwent an operation in Midland and one at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minesota. It appears that the operation in Rochester, Minnesota was not successful.

Appellant’s first seven points deal with alleged misconduct of the jury. We feel that these points should be overruled for the following reasons. First, the parties involved are not related to or close friends of any of the jurors, and not one word can be found nor did any individual suggest to a juror what he or she ought to do. We will review these instances briefly. Juror Harrington testified that he was contacted on more than one occasion by a man in the hall of the courthouse during recess periods, and stated that he had known this individual before, but did not describe him as a friend or give his name. The gist of the incident was that this man mentioned to Juror Harrington that appellee was his family doctor; that he was a good doctor and that he thought Dr. Johnston was a real fine man and didn’t think the doctor should be sued and up here in the courthouse. The juror further testified that this man approached him four or five times; that he didn’t think much about it at first, but finally Juror Harrington stated that he started going downstairs to avoid this individual while getting a coke, and that he, Juror Harrington, would stay down there until it was time for the jurors to come back to the jury room. All of these incidents happened outside of the courtroom. Juror Harrington also stated there was quite a bit said in the jury room about what “preponderance” meant. Appellant claims that it was error because some unidentified juror commented that the term “preponderance” meant the greatest number of witnesses; but the evidence shows that the foreman answered this by reading the court’s charge on preponderance of the evidence, and appellant does not try to show that any harm resulted to her from this particular comment. Juror Nance testified that a lady approached him outside the door of the courtroom and told him that appellee was a man of very fine character and a very fine doctor. He further said that she simply walked up and addressed him, made those statements and, in Juror Nance’s own words, “I just walked off”. Juror Pierce testified to hearing a conversation in a Midland hotel in which he says he heard one fellow say that the doctor seldom loses, or never does, or something like that. He thinks maybe the statement might have been, “He said the doctor never lost a case”.

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Bluebook (online)
450 S.W.2d 351, 1970 Tex. App. LEXIS 2451, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ausley-v-johnston-texapp-1970.