In Episode 1 of Season 4 of Beating Goliath: A Plaintiff’s Pursuit of Justice, you will meet Billy Fern, a young man who had to undergo a life-changing foot amputation due to medical negligence.
Back in 2014, Billy was an active and adventurous 25-year-old college graduate who was pursuing his personal and professional goals. That year, he was diagnosed with pulmonary embolism and placed on a blood thinner regimen. As part of his treatment plan, he stopped taking the blood thinners in June, and about a week later, he began experiencing foot pain. Despite numerous doctor visits and complaints of increasing foot pain, Billy’s concerns were dismissed by multiple physicians. By the time a doctor finally took notice, it was too late.
This is the story of how Billy Fern overcame unimaginable circumstances both physically and emotionally, and pursued justice with the help of the attorneys of Salvi, Schostok & Pritchard, P.C.
You Will Meet:
- Billy Fern, Plaintiff
- A young man who suffered the loss of his foot
- “My foot kept getting worse and I was no longer able to move it.”
- Bill Fern
- Billy’s father
- “At this point, just being able to stay alive was just another critical phase in his medical treatment because there’s no turning back once the gangrene starts.”
- Laurel Fern
- Billy’s mother
- “We really went into that surgery without realizing just how precarious that situation was. He had even warned us he could die on the table.”
- David J. Rashid, Partner at Salvi, Schostok & Pritchard
- Attorney representing Billy against Central DuPage Emergency Physicians
- “It sounded like this was a situation of opportunities missed to solve his occlusion and to get it corrected before it resulted in the amputation.”
