Consumerist
Remember Brian Persaud, the Brooklyn construction worker who tried to sue a New York hospital for performing a by-the-books rectal exam on him in 2003? On Monday, a Manhattan jury tossed his lawsuit, claiming he failed to show he suffered assault and battery. This means we'll never get to hear both sides splitting hairs about what constitutes a full "rectal examination"—Persaud says the doctor did it, and the doctor says she didn't.
Dr. Susan M. Trocciola, who was a resident in trauma medicine at the time, testified that she placed a finger in Mr. Persaud's rectal area after conducting a physical exam of his spine to check for a spinal-cord injury.What's the real truth? Will it ever see the light of day?
Whether the rectal exam was performed was a matter of dispute. Mr. Persaud testified that he felt a finger inserted in his rectum, but Dr. Trocciola said the exam was never carried out.
Persaud's own history and past behavior may have hurt his case:
Mr. Persaud was not necessarily the most sympathetic plaintiff. It emerged during the trial that Mr. Persaud, a native of Guyana who did not complete high school, had been convicted of two misdemeanors: attempted aggravated harassment for making phone calls to an ex-girlfriend's mother in 2001 and criminal mischief for threatening a fellow motorist with a baseball bat after a minor car accident in 2007. Mr. Persaud had filed a workers' compensation claim and also sued the owner of the site where he was injured. He was awarded about $4,000 in the compensation claim, but the suit was settled for a negligible sum, Mr. Marrone said.
In a phone interview, Mr. Marrone said of his client, "He's not a perfect person, but he's not a criminal by any standard of the word. He's got a lot of anxiety. He reacts negatively in stressful situations and he has a short temper."
"Jury Rejects Suit Over Attempted Rectal Exam" [New York Times "City Room" Blog]
RELATED
"Doctor Forces Rectal Exam, Patient Punches Doctor, Police Arrest Patient, Patient Sues"
(Photo: Getty)
Comments
wasnt the whole issue about whether the man was coherent enough to refuse a particularly traumatic physical examination? (I'd call being forcibly held down & penetrated... traumatic).
I know if I hurt my back, I dont want some doctor forcibly holding me down & sticking a finger up my ass! Proper procedure or not!
Seems to me that an anal massage might actually calm the guy down. Somewhat.
That's it! I am going to get one of those medical alert bracelets that has a signed statement that I refuse being rectally probed in case of a head injury where I am still conscious & able to object. A liability waiver will be included.
Damn doctors & their anal-probing god complexes!
I LOVE that picture.
Also, the world would be a lot better off if anxious, violent men got a little more in touch with their prostates.
@PsychicPsycho3: Dr. Morin's book on Anal Health is a decent read.
family guy did an episode about this. i had no idea someone was really dumb enough to sue for attempted assault. he will regret doing this if he really ever does have prostate cancer.
This picture is so creepily appropriate. I love it.
If a doctor needs to insert his finger in my ass to make sure I don't have spinal damage, go right ahead. I'd rather feel violated then paralyzed any day.
great picture to accompany the story! spot on
just want to also point out that having been in an emergency room quite a few timesmyself....the amount of compassion shown by the staff is often nonexistant. I guess its because they have to deal with all kinds of crap & they are desensitized to it (still no excuse). I can understand how being held down & penetrated against your will by a stonefaced & seemingly uncaring ER staff (who you thought are there to help) can be a tramatic experience... especially to someone from a third world country not used to how things are done here.
Rofl... Reminds me of a very similar Family Guy episode.
I get the feeling he's the kind of hyper-masculine dude who would equate a rectal probe to losing his anal virginity. AND HE WOULD THOROUGHLY ENJOY IT.
@Trai_Dep: are you referring to "milking the prostate?"
@richcreamerybutter: "Milking the prostate" + your commenter name = best/worst combination ever. Maybe this can get crossposted on Fleshbot.
@DanC922:
Ha! I was thinking the same thing.
I'm thankful the Consumerist photo wizzes restrained themselves from using the burn tool on the model's fingertip.
Maybe instead of "Do Not Resuscitate", "Do Not Prostate"?
richcreamerybutter & Alex Chasick, I'd like to see milking the prostate + It's Not Butter.
The best advice for squeemish, male potential car crash victims: have your honey buckle on a strap-on. And a vengeful, leering grin. STAT!
@forgottenpassword: Silly doctors in bustling, triage-stressed ERs only being concerned with, y'know, saving people's lives. How thoughtless!
this is great news for sexually deviant doctors everywhere... they are now free to finger your butthole with relative immunity!
I nominate this article for best marriage of photo and topic. ever.
"i will not turn a brown eye to this. i am going to sue that bastard and make him pay out the ass. i'm going to be real anal about this. no ifs, ands, or butts. sphincter."
/someone was going to post it
Possible spinal injury --> probably a head injury = implied consent
@Crazytree:
lol, I had a girlfriend once who was a nurse & dated a lot of doctors and she told me that a LOT of doctors are on the "freaky-deaky" side sexually. SHe had a theory that it was because they had to be so serious & professional all day long. Kinda like how japanese salaryman often are.
+ Watch video
I just HAD to.......
If jelly were not to be used, that's a lawsuit.
You mean, it's NOT normal to get a rectal exam every time one visits the doctor? Every time I go to the doctor, it's the same thing: weight, blood pressure, pulse, temperature, rectum.
@forgottenpassword: Not even if it can possibly save your life and stop you from being paralyzed? Then you may need to get your priorities in order.
FYI: Its normal to get a rectal exam after a suspected spinal injury. This is because the nerves that connect to the rectum are the last to leave the spinal cord, so if they are intact, the entire spinal column is.
@forgottenpassword: That's a lot to fit on one bracelet. Maybe you'll need one of those hub caps dangling from your neck.
Not only does the picture perfectly fit the topic put the picture's hover-over tag made me giggle...
I was in a car accident in college and awoke in the hospital emergency with two nurses holding my ankles and a doctor inserting what felt like his entire fist into my rectum. Not the most pleasant thing to awaken to but I never thought about the possibility of suing. Is there a statute of limitations on this sort of thing?
Oh fer crissake. Men need to get over it with this anal-exam phobia. (Hetero men, I mean.) By the time we reach 25 or so, we women have had all of our orifices examined so many times, we can almost sleep through it. "Violated" -- hee hee. You guys don't know from violated.
a) Sue them for doing the rectal probe.
b) Sue them for failing to do the rectal probe.
Picture + headline = crushing victory
Hmmm -- now if the doctor looked like the article pic, I wouldn't be suing her, I'd be asking for her phone number.
I tend to be attracted to the wild-eyed ones...
I bet if the woman in the pic was doing the rectal exam, he wouldnt have a problem. Heck, I'd let her give me a rectal exam.
"tossed his lawsuit" is that a little toungue in cheek humor?
I love how harassing his girlfriend, whether anyone approves of it or not, is mentioned. It is not relevant to the case at all.
If a vagrant tells me my car is on fire, it's either true or it's false. It doesn't matter if he is a drug addict ex-convict and is homeless. Just as possesing several post-graduate degrees does not make someone somehow virtuous and incapable of lying when something is in their own best interests (like not being fired or protecting themselves and their place of employment from a large settlement).
The whole issue here was that he refused the exam multiple times, even begging them not to do it. Then they forcibly sedated and intubated him.
There are other ways to check for a spinal injury besides rectal tone. I'm thinking that his flailing around and hitting the doctor were probably pretty strong indicators that he wasn't injured.
The ER staff was wrong to do what they did the way they did it.
The ER staff just liked it...
The most important matter of the case is if Dr Susan Trocciola was hot or not.
and I love that freaky cover image!
Wait. You mean my doctor was supposed have used his finger?!
So, when this guy waits outside the doctor's house and inserts a fun lawn care instrument it will be ok right?
I know when I was younger a 'dentist' on an Army base decided the best way to remove one of my wisdom teeth was with:
1 a local
2 pliers
3 vigorous yanking on my mouth
This got him:
1 knocked the hell out
2 reprimanded
3 demoted in rank
I remember the nurses eyes when my anxiety and fear turned to murderous rage... She raised her hands back and pretty much watched the show. Afterwards when they were wiping the blood off my neck they said they couldnt believe he kept attempting it after my jaw started popping and the nurse kept hugging me telling me everything would be alright...
Gotta love military medical care for dependants (I was 17)
V
@cmhbob:
I actually work on a Trauma team. Our job is to do a rapid trauma-based exam the moment the patient rolls in the door. This is under the Advanced Trauma Life Support protocol as laid out by the American College of Surgeons. The goal is to identify any life-threatening problems within seconds, and get the patient to the OR fast if needed, because that is how you save lives in trauma.
If a patient is thrashing around, and has a head injury, the standard of care is to sedate the patient so we can obtain a CT scan and rule out an acute head bleed. The patient's lawyers claim that was assault and battery, which the the courts have already determined is not the case.
We routinely defer the rectal exam in patients who (a) show no sign of spinal cord injury or (b) have a mechanism of injury that lowers our suspicion for a hidden abdominal or pelvic injury. The doctor in this case claims she did NOT do a rectal exam, which is probably true. Believe it or not, doing a rectal exam is not a highlight of most medical professionals' day.
Actually, the comments at the "tossed his lawsuit" link are pretty much what I just said. Check 'em out.
It is a damn rectal exam. Nobody likes it, but you do it. Like taxes. A physician's finger is smaller than your stool, especially if it is a female.
@forgottenpassword: Wait, I'm from "here" and I'm still not sure getting his ass fingerbanged qualifies as "how things are done here".
Maybe you inhabit a different, more rectally liberal america.
"In a phone interview, Mr. Marrone said of his client, 'He's not a perfect person, but he's not a criminal by any standard of the word.'"
And then he didn't say "unless your definition of 'criminal' is one who has been convicted of crimes, including 'criminal mischief', in which case I guess he is a criminal."
Sorry but I can't help but think of the episode where on Family Guy where Peter gets his exam.
Mr. Marrone said of his client, "He's not a perfect person, but he's not a criminal by any standard of the word.
IANAL, but I am a thinker and I believe that if you have been convicted of a crime that makes you a criminal in every sense of the word.
Am I right?
"Why does everything today have to involve something going into or coming out of my ass!"
-Cartman
Er, guys?
The doctor said she "placed a finger in Mr