Glicklich to Resume Malpractice Fight

A cancer patient, whose award of nearly $400,000 in malpractice damages against a University Health Services doctor (UHS) and her private gynecologist was nullified this June, will resume her fight in appellate court, probably by early spring.

Middlesex County Judge Thomas R. Morse Jr. '48 "set aside" a jury's February 24 verdict against the doctors, saying that attorneys for Gena Glicklich had not adequately proven that the physicians' treatment affected the progression of Glicklich's illness.

Glicklich. who is on leave from the Graduate School of Education, had charged the doctors with failing to diagnose and treat correctly a cancerous lump in her right breast, which spread to her brain and became inoperable.

As a result, she says she will be unable to raise her nine-year-old son, and doctors say she may die within a year.

Insufficient Evidence

Morse, who presided over the original trial, did not dispute the jury's finding of negligence on the part of Dr. Alan R. Spievack, a UHS assistant surgeon and assistant clinical professor of surgery, and Dr. Joan R. Golub, Glicklich's private physician.

But he did find that Glicklich's attorneys had failed to show sufficient evidence that the doctors' negligence resulted in deterioration of Glicklich's condition.

Attorneys for Spievack and Jones had argued that her condition would be no different today if they had treated her differently; they appealed the damage finding within days of the original decision.

Citing confusion over the amount of evidence legally required to prove that deterioration has been caused, Morse ordered the case sent up to appellate court.

Attorneys on each side said yesterday that trial preparation will probably postpone the start of the appeal until early spring.

Raymond J. Kenney, Spievack's attorney, and Clyde Bergstresser, Glicklich's attorney, agreed yesterday that reversals by trial judges in malpractice cases are relatively rare.

"Obviously we were very pleased with the ruling," Kenney said, adding, "We felt we had a good argument; it's a complex issue."

Morse was unavailable for comment yesterday.

Saying her intent in suing the doctors was "to make sure women learn that there are options for themselves in relation to breast cancer treatment," Glicklich said yesterday that she feels her "going to trial is finished," and that it accomplished what she wanted it to.

She explained that "the purpose of the trial was not for making millions of dollars; it was to inform the many women who have been wronged by the medical profession nationwide."

Since the case will appear in appeals court, she said she doesn't see Morse's ruling as a reversal.

Dr. Warren E.C. Wacker, director of UHS, said this week that the service's quality-assurance committee will not begin its investigation of Spievack's conduct until the appellate court hands down its decision. Wacker said UHS attorneys have told him there is a "high probability" the reversal will be sustained.

Sholem Postel, deputy director of UHS and chairman of the quality-assurance panel, said. "We don't think it would be prudent to set in motion an investigation which could conceivably be used in a litigational process." The investigation will take place regardless of the appellate court's finding. Postel added.

Even if the committee finds Spievack's conduct "not quite up to our standards." Postel said, "that doesn't necessarily mean (he's) fired." The committee's recommendation in such cases binges on "the gravity of the error in judgment" it discovers