THE CASE: A Norco Pulley System is commonly used in physical therapy to lightly rehabilitate an injured shoulder.  In this case, our client was recovering from a right shoulder surgery caused by a serious truck wreck injury.  The surgeon used wires and anchors to maintain the injured body parts in anatomical position.  At the hospital physical therapy department, the physical therapist used a door to set up the Norco Pulley System.  Unfortunately for our client, the chosen door opened to an adjacent room where a second physical therapist was working. The first physical therapist did not lock the door, but warned the second physical therapist not to open the door. The second physical therapist forgot the warning and negligently opened the unlocked door.  The Norco Pulley System came crashing down at the same time our client was pulling downward with her injured shoulder muscles. As the pulley system fell, the sudden and abnormal force on the injured shoulder broke the surgical anchors causing a massive tear in the rotator cuff.  Our client endured a second surgery far more difficult than the first.  To add to our client's harms and losses, a reverse shoulder replacement surgery is likely.

LESSONS LEARNED: Common sense tells you to lock the door.  And in this case, so did the instruction  instruction manual.

BURMAN LAW RESULT:  The case settled for a confidential amount.   Our client was very happy with the result.