A patient from Minnesota has reportedly sued her dentist after he performed 32 procedures in a go, leaving the patient disfigured and distressed.
The patient, Kathleen Wilson, a resident of Minneapolis, filed a lawsuit against her dentist, Dr. Kevin Molldrem, last week at the Hennepin County district court. Dr. Molldrem runs Molldrem Family Dentistry in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. He is accused of medical negligence, which caused injuries to Wilson through four root canals, eight dental crowns, and 20 fillings in a single sitting in July 2020, providing unsafe doses of anesthesia during the procedure, and subsequently falsifying the records to cover it up.
Ms. Wilson’s legal team informed that they retained Dr. Avrum Goldstein, a dentist from Florida, to serve as an expert witness to review the treatment records. In his report dated November 14, Dr. Goldstein stated that Dr. Molldrem’s diagnosis about all her teeth being decayed was correct. But unfortunately, the line of treatment adopted by him was incorrect, hasty, and of poor quality. He acknowledged that Ms. Wilson’s condition was rare and that it was impossible to treat all 28 teeth in a single appointment. “Dr. Molldrem’s medical intervention did not address her susceptibility to the disease or the possibility of losing her teeth,” added Dr. Goldstein.
According to Dr. Goldstein, Ms. Wilson was required to have been given a slow and careful, thoughtfully measured treatment for her disease. The methodology adopted to fill all the holes in her teeth was practically not possible in a single visit. He further added that such a long procedure required maintaining the anesthesia effect, and an excess amount was administered for the same. Dr. Molldrem’s anesthesia records showed that the dosage administered exceeded the permissible limits for the procedure. The required amount should have been 490 mg, but 960 mg was administered by Dr. Molldrem.
Apart from the medical costs, Ms. Wilson said that she suffered pain, embarrassment, distress, and disfigurement after the five and a half-hour procedure. She reportedly received further treatment from the University of Minnesota Dental School in 2022 to fix the negligent work of Dr. Mollderm. She has asked for $50,000 as compensation for the damages.
(Inputs from various sources)
(Rehash/ Dr. Sushmita Ganguli)
