County OKs Settlement With Paralyzed Woman

County supervisors Tuesday unanimously approved paying $2.45 million to settle a lawsuit filed by a woman who was paralyzed from the waist down after being treated in two county hospitals.

First, Kathleen Kariotis was transferred from a private hospital to Olive View-UCLA Medical Center, where she spent three days suffering from back pain and a growing numbness in her legs, county documents show. Against medical advice, she later left the hospital with preliminary diagnoses ranging from lupus to kidney stones.

The next day, she returned with her lower body paralyzed and was transferred to County-USC Medical Center, where she had to wait 24 hours for a standard scan that showed she had an epidural abscess, the documents state.

An hour after the results came back, Kariotis underwent surgery, but she remained paralyzed.

In a memo for supervisors, county attorneys wrote that medical staff at Olive View should have diagnosed the abscess sooner and the tests at County-USC should not have taken so long. They predicted that a jury could return an $11-million verdict and urged settlement for $2.45 million.