cruise ship doctors

Published on: November 18, 2024

Over 100 people sue after cruise ship illness. Now, the cruise line is being accused of downplaying the numbers.

More than 100 passengers who traveled on P&O’s Ventura, a ship owned by Carnival Cruise Line, have filed suit after they say they got sick on board.

Attorneys for the passengers claim there were “repeated outbreaks” of illness on the ship between April and June. About 519 passengers reported for weeks about their symptoms of norovirus, a stomach bug that causes inflammation in the stomach and intestines and is highly contagious. The first outbreak allegedly took place in May during a two-week cruise around the Canary Islands.

In reporting from the BBC it was alleged that Carnival communicated that less than 1% of passengers experienced symptoms while Southampton health officials claimed the number was closer to 12% of passengers.

Published on: November 12, 2024

Hurricane-Force Winds Injure Cruise Ship Passenger. What Do These Companies Owe Their Passengers?

By Leesfield & Partners

Hurricane-Force Winds Injure Cruise Ship Passenger. What Do These Companies Owe Their Passengers?

A Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines passenger was injured after their ship was hit by forceful winds, according to USA Today.

The ship, Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas, “experienced sudden movement” on Nov. 7 as the ship headed to Miami, Florida, from Barcelona, Spain. The incident happened as the ship sailed through Tenerife in Spain’s Canary Islands. The passenger is being disembarked for additional medical attention, a cruise line spokesperson told reporters.

Published on: October 25, 2024

Critics Rave Over Cruise Ship Doctor TV Show. Leesfield & Partners Knows the Reality is Starkly Different

By Leesfield & Partners

Despite great reviews calling Joshua Jackson a “miracle worker” for pulling off the antics shown in his new show, Doctor Odyssey, which follows the adventures of a cruise ship doctor, Leesfield & Partners knows the bleak reality and its consequences for passengers.

In nearly five decades of personal injury practice in Miami, Leesfield & Partners attorneys have recovered over $66 million for hundreds of victims of negligence at the hands of cruise ship doctors. Despite these companies marketing their ships as vessels with state-of-the-art infirmaries and staffed with some of the leading medical professionals in the field, this is often not the case. In fact, it has been the experience of this law firm that these ships have hired subpar doctors and nurses who do not meet the standards necessary to practice medicine in the United States.

These companies are able to skirt these regulations because they operate under different regulations while at sea, often traveling between countries and in international waters, paving the way for doctors who are not licensed in the U.S. to be hired for these roles.

Published on: October 2, 2024

At Least 180 Passengers Fell Ill Aboard Royal Caribbean International’s Radiance of the Seas. What Happened to Them?

By Leesfield & Partners

Over 180 people were sickened with a suspected gastrointestinal illness while vacationing on a seven-day voyage aboard Royal Caribbean International’s Radiance of the Seas cruise ship, the Centers for Disease Control announced Monday.

As of Tuesday, the cause of an illness that led to 180 passengers becoming sick aboard the ship had not been released. A total of 2,172 passengers were on board at the time and the afflicted accounted for just over 8% of passengers.

Three of the over 800 crewmembers on the ship reported being sick. Since the illness was discovered, RCI and its working crew allegedly increased cleaning and disinfection procedures to combat the spread of the illness, made announcements to notify passengers of the outbreak and collected samples from the sick for testing.

Published on: September 5, 2024

Doctor mistakenly removes man’s liver instead of his spleen. Now, his wife is planning to sue.

By Leesfield & Partners

The wife of a man who died during a surgery where his doctor removed his liver instead of his spleen is planning to sue, according to reporting from local news outlets.

The incident began when the man complained of feeling pain in his side while he and his wife visited their Florida rental property from Alabama. At the hospital, the man was allegedly planning to return to Alabama to see his usual doctor but was instead persuaded by a medical team in Florida to go ahead with the surgery, according to the family’s attorneys. Doctors are said to have “persuaded” him by explaining the potential risks that could arise if he delayed surgery.

A surgical pathology report listed the organ that was removed as a “grossly identifiable” liver that was partly torn. When removing the liver, the doctor tore blood vessels that caused “catastrophic blood loss resulting in death,” the wife’s attorneys said in a statement to local news outlets.

Published on: August 23, 2024

Largest cruise ship in the world makes headlines, stuns online viewers. Should passengers be wary of ‘floating cities?’

By Leesfield & Partners

Royal Caribbean’s Icon of the Seas continues to make headlines months after its inaugural sail and people are still talking about the enormity of it.

Though the ship has been sailing since the beginning of the year, a recent video featuring its arrival in Port Miami has gained traction online with many users asking “how does this thing manage to float?”

The answer can be found in most grade school science classrooms – buoyancy. When a massive ship such as the Icon of the Seas is hulking past seemingly without effort, it is because it is pushing aside water, displacing enough to equal its weight. Structural designs such as a U-shaped hull help the ship carve through the waves and displace water. The hull’s round edges reduce potential drag and keep the ship from rolling. When building the immense ‘floating cities’ we know as cruises today, engineers must take weight distribution into account. Ships that are bottom-heavy will sink while the opposite would cause the ship to be destabilized, increasing the probability it would topple over.