A physician lost a case for $2.6 million for following instructions
“Alexander Mitchell, 16, of Conway, N.H., died after swallowing nearly 300 aspirin pills. Alexander, a student at Proctor Academy in Andover, was depressed over a relationship.

The Mitchells alleged that Christopher Occhino, a visiting doctor filling in at Franklin Hospital, did not order their son transferred to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center soon enough for more specialized treatment. Occhino now practices in New York.

Occhino’s lawyer, Christopher Nyhan, said Occhino had consulted with a Dartmouth-Hitchcock expert soon after Alexander Mitchell arrived in Franklin, but was told to do additional tests before transferring the boy. When Occhino did the tests and made a follow-up call to Dartmouth-Hitchcock, staff there recommended transferring Mitchell, Nyhan said.

‘Occhino agreed, and the transfer was undertaken,’ Nyhan said.

Nyhan said jurors concluded that because the overdose had been so unusually large, the doctor should have known to transfer Mitchell much sooner.”

Perhaps if the physician did an earlier “defensive transfer” to a tertiary care facility, he would not have been sued.