20130814_ca_halifax

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Wednesday, August 14, 2013

metronews.ca | twitter.com/metrohalifax | facebook.com/metrohalifax

HALIFAX NEWS WORTH SHARING.

From Yarmouth to Maine, and back again Province negotiating with firm to PAGE 3 resume ferry service

Still right on Target

Paranoia or legit concern?

Three branches of the megaretailer set to open in HRM this fall, possibly as early as PAGE 4 September

Totally legit. Spycam seller talks about tiny eyes in disguise ... PAGE 9 While films glamorize corporate PAGE 13 spies

CHAMPS BACK ON ICE MOOSE COACH SAYS LET’S DO IT ALL AGAIN PAGE 26

‘She was in a state of bewilderment’ Capital Health. Lawyer says woman who had breast unnecessarily removed to file lawsuit HALEY RYAN

haley.ryan@metronews.ca

Ray Wagner poses for a portrait in his law office in Halifax on Tuesday. Wagner is representing a woman in her late 60s who is filing a malpractice lawsuit against Capital Health after a mix-up led to an unneeded mastectomy. JEFF HARPER/METRO

A Capital Health patient who had an unneeded mastectomy is in a “state of bewilderment” and is hoping a lawsuit will bring some answers, says her lawyer. Ray Wagner, a serious injury lawyer in the city, said Tuesday that he is handling the Halifax woman’s malpractice case. He said she is in her late 60s. “You’re angry about the fact the procedure took place and then … ‘Why me? Why did it happen to me?’” Wagner said about his client’s emotional state when they met May 6. On Monday, Capital Health released information about two lab mistakes made

this spring affecting four patients. One of the errors resulted in Wagner’s client having a breast removed when it wasn’t necessary, while the other saw a patient have a biopsy they didn’t need. Wagner said the case is of “huge human interest” because it could have happened to anyone. His client was misdiagnosed when her report was switched with another’s who needed the mastectomy and didn’t get it until after the error was discovered. Wagner said his client had accepted her cancer diagnosis, and went into surgery

fused and is now looking for answers to “put it all together.” “You have to deal with life with one breast.... There’s a whole host of problems that’ll occur over one’s lifetime from having had this procedure,” Wagner said. He said he is drafting up the papers for the medical malpractice and system-error lawsuit, and will deliver them within the next three weeks. According to his website, Wagner has 30 years of experience and his clients have included the former residents of the Nova Scotia Home for Colored Children, and

Quoted

“There’s a considerable amount of scarring, both emotional and physical.” Lawyer Ray Wagner, about his client because she was advised it would increase her life expectancy. Wagner said after finding out she did not have cancer, she went from angry to con-

residents of the Sydney Tar Ponds. A Capital Health spokesperson said Tuesday that CEO Chris Power couldn’t comment on a potential lawsuit.

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