American died because doctor removed the wrong organ during procedure, family says | Florida

The family of a 70-year-old Alabama man who died last month said his death was the result of a doctor removing the wrong organ during a surgery in Florida.

William Bryan, 70, and his wife, Beverly, were visiting their rental property in Okaloosa County this summer when Bryan suddenly began to experience pain in his left flank, according to his wife, Beverly’s law firm. Bryan then went to the hospital and was admitted for further testing due to concerns about a spleen abnormality.

The family says Bryan and his wife were initially hesitant to have surgery in Florida, but doctors at Ascension Sacred Heart Emerald Coast Hospital in Walton County convinced them to go ahead. They claim they were told Bryan could experience serious complications if he left the hospital.

On August 21, 2024, surgeon Dr. Thomas Shaknovsky performed a hand-assisted laparoscopic splenectomy, according to the family.

The family’s attorney claims that during the surgery, the doctor removed Bryan’s liver and “severed the main vessel supplying the liver, causing immediate and catastrophic blood loss that resulted in death.”

The surgeon, the family claims, “labeled the liver sample removed as a ‘spleen’ and it was only after death that it was discovered that the organ removed was actually Bryan’s liver and not the spleen.”

According to reports, after the procedure, the doctor told Bryan’s wife Beverly that the “spleen” was so diseased that it was four times larger than normal and had migrated to the other side of Bryan’s body.

“Typical human anatomy dictates that the liver is naturally located on the opposite side of the abdominal cavity and is many times larger than the spleen,” the Bryan family’s attorney said in a statement.

“The family was informed that Bryan’s spleen, the cause of his original symptom profile upon presentation to the hospital, was still in his body and had a small cyst on its surface.”

The lawyer claims that the doctor performed a “wrong-site surgery” back in 2023, in which he mistakenly removed part of a patient’s pancreas instead of performing the intended adrenalectomy.

This case, the lawyer said, was settled confidentially and the doctor remained a surgeon.

Beverly hired a lawyer after her husband’s death to seek “justice for her husband,” the law firm said in a statement.

“She does not want this doctor to continue treating patients,” her attorney said, adding that Beverly is seeking both criminal and civil litigation over her husband’s death.

In a statement, Beverly said: “My husband died while lying helpless on Dr. Shaknovsky’s operating table. I do not want anyone else to die in a hospital because of his incompetence, when he should have known or knew that he had previously made drastic, life-changing surgical errors.”

As the Miami Herald reported Wednesday, Shaknovsky has not been criminally charged and there are no disciplinary proceedings or public complaints against him. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Miami Herald.

Ascension Sacred Heart Emerald Coast Hospital did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Guardian, but said in a statement to the Miami Herald that it “takes allegations such as this very seriously and that our leadership team is thoroughly investigating this incident.”

It added: “Our thoughts and prayers are with the family,” and the hospital “does not comment on specific patient cases or ongoing litigation.”

Bryan and Beverly were married for 33 years and have three children and eight grandchildren, according to his August obituary. He worked as a boilermaker and was also a Marine veteran, serving in Vietnam.