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HONOLULU (AP) — A jury has awarded millions of dollars to an Oahu man who sued a hospital for not diagnosing a tumor in his mouth, his attorney said.
Attorney Rick Fried said jurors reached the verdict Tuesday and awarded $5.62 million to his client, Jeff Kim.
Kim, 43, of Mililani, went to an ear, nose and throat doctor at Straub Clinic & Hospital in 2008 with pain in his mouth and feared it was cancer, Fried said.
"They failed to make a diagnosis of his symptoms before they let him go," Fried said. "The test that would have diagnosed the cancer was readily available at Straub but not done."
Kim's tumor grew from the size of a lima bean to the size of a fist before the cancer was found in 2011. The Hawaiian Airlines flight attendant underwent numerous surgeries in Hawaii and Seattle to get the cancer out of his mouth and jaw and reconstruct his face, Fried said.
Kim no longer has feeling in one side of his mouth and now has a big lump on the side his face, his attorney said.
"We respect the legal process and the time that the jury put into the case, but we do disagree with the verdict," Straub spokeswoman Kristen Bonilla said in a statement. "We are exploring our options with our legal counsel."
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