The family of Ruth Colby, former CEO of Silver Cross in New Lenox, has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the University of Chicago Hospitals and Health System and her doctor after she suffered complications and died following heart surgery.
The lawsuit, which seeks $100,000 in damages, states Dr. Husman Balkhy did not perform the correct procedure to address Colby’s heart rhythm problems.
Colby, 69, a Mokena resident, and her family met with Balkhy Aug. 2, which is when he recommended she undergo a robotic minimally invasive valve repair, according to the lawsuit.
Don DeFrank, Colby’s husband, said Balkhy assured them he had done the procedure “thousands of times” and that it had a 98% success rate.
“He told us she’d … have an active life. He was selling his surgery to us,” DeFrank said. “It did not happen like that.”
Balkhy performed the operation Sept. 25, and it was supposed to last 3 1/2 hours, DeFrank said. Eight hours later, DeFrank said, Balky came out to talk to him and told him the procedure “threw him big softballs” and he blamed Colby’s petite size.
“That really alarmed me,” DeFrank said.
While the robotic minimally invasive valve repair procedure is a selling point to patients, according to the lawsuit, Balkhy shaved the septum, which resulted in her severe systolic anterior motion, or SAM, to worsen.
The lawsuit states the procedure Blakhy should have performed was a mitral valve replacement with a bioprosthetic, which would’ve addressed her diseased heart valve and “corrected any possibility or question of SAM.”
The University of Chicago Hospitals and Health System did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A Silver Cross Hospital spokeswoman declined to comment.
Colby was taken to the intensive care unit in critical condition following the procedure, according to the lawsuit. She was unable to transition off bypass and suffered severe cardiac arrest, according to the lawsuit.
Colby died Oct. 15 due to prolonged cadiogenic shock, organ malperfusion and worsening multi-system organ failure, the lawsuit states.
Colby was chief executive officer for Silver Cross from 2017 until her death, DeFrank said. Keith Hebeisen, the lawyer representing Colby’s family, said shortly before the procedure, Colby signed a contract to remain CEO through 2026.
“Ruth always turned around and helped the people behind her,” DeFrank said. “She was a very caring and sharing person.”
The couple married in 2004, DeFrank said, and she leaves behind a son, David Chodak. DeFrank said he and Chodak are traumatized by what happened.
“We are just so distraught and devastated by this,” DeFrank said.
The lawsuit seeks $50,000 each from the University of Chicago Hospitals and Health System and Balkhy.
Hebeisen said Blakhy may have said the procedure had a 98% success rate, but that didn’t happen.
“Unfortunately it became a 100% failure, so very tragic,” Hebeisen said.
akukulka@chicagotribune.com
