By Hal Davis
A Korean woman struck blind by a medical blunder one the largest damage settlement in the state’s history yesterday for $5.5 million.
Susie Kim, 45, of York Avenue, Manhattan, settled out of court with New York hospital, six years after losing her sight from a misdiagnosed form of glaucoma.
Her lawyers Rosenberg & Horowitz., told the Supreme Court that Ms. Cannon, a former $500 a week chemical analyst at the hospital on E. 68th St., complained to doctors of pain and nausea.
She was sent home as a flu victim, but actually had acute angle closure glaucoma-a form of the disease acknowledged as curable if diagnosed early.
Since losing her sight, Miss Kim has been living on savings and a small pension.
The settlement came after a three-day trial in which the hospital admitted liability. Miss Campbell received $20,000 a year for life, $900,000 in a lump sum and one million in stages over 20 years.
She’s guaranteed $4.4 million in a normal life expectancy would net $5.5 million which is believed to be almost 3 times more than the previous record awarded for damages.
Ms. Kim’s father was a South Korean senior official who was kidnapped and murdered by the North Koreans in 1952. She has lived in the US showed she was a teenager.