As the Fargo WHO closes, I review two abortion malpractice cases that had been filed against the clinic and its doctors.

Patient Nancy S. age 26, filed suit against the Fargo WHO and abortionist George Miks. Nancy said that Miks performed the abortion on her on January 29, 1988.

"Miks," Nancy said, "knew that I was very uncertain, even unwilling to have the procedure done. He did not give me any drug to suppress the pain." Nancy said that when she made a request for pain medication, Miks responded, "You have gone through childbirth and this is much less painful than that."

When Miks began the abortion, Nancy said, "I began to breath rapidly and hyperventilate. He instructed me not to protest. He said I could take the pain. Finally when I screamed they said that I became uncontrollable." Nancy added, "Miks started my procedure and when I panicked he quit because he wanted to teach me a lesson."

Nancy was concerned about how quickly Miks worked. After the abortion, Nancy said that the recovery room nurse told her that Miks hadn't gotten all the "parts."

Later, Nancy said, the nurse asked her, "Do you want to see your baby?" Nancy said yes, and the nurse left the room. When she returned, she told Nancy, "We can't show you the baby because your baby was mixed together with all of the other babies."

The nurse later told Nancy, "The doctor had decided he got all the parts." Nancy was sent home.

Nancy said that the evening of January 29, she called the clinic to report severe emotional distress. "I was an emotional wreck," Nancy recalled. They did not return her call, and she left a second message, which also was not returned.

The next day, Nancy expelled tissue while she was in the shower. "I thought it would be a blood clot, and I found in my hand the face, shoulders and arms of my baby."

Very distressed, Nancy called the clinic, but was told that the doctor "got everything," and that what she had expelled was either uterine lining or part of a twin. She was told that there was no need to bring the tissue to a doctor or hospital for examination. They told her, "Just get rid of it. Put it behind you and be calm."

That afternoon Nancy took the tissues to a hospital, seeking medical care and an examination of the tissues. She requested that they just examine the tissues, but not dispose of them. She was given antibiotics, pain killers, and medicine to contract her uterus. She returned later to the emergency room, and required a D&C to remove additional retained tissues.

"I have had great amount of both emotional and physical problems: depression and guilt, remorse and feeling of worthlessness," Nancy says. She reports that she has "frequent nightmares of holding a baby in my hands, having a complete face and looking up at me, seeing the remains of my baby all cut up in my hand and having to take my dead baby to the hospital."

Nancy reported that she became addicted to her pain killers after many hospitalizations for post-abortion pain and infections. "I am now told that my medical records were altered and that there were late entries made. It appears to me that there has been a deliberate cover up of the mess that was made of my abortion procedure."

Nancy's attorney described the abortion counselor as "a woman whose sole credential for work in abortion counseling appears to be the fact that she has had an abortion."

Covering the lawsuit, a reporter quoted Miks as saying that Nancy was "uncooperative" during the abortion. "She moved around quite a bit, making the procedure difficult. She screamed and carried on, or at least verbally was quite loud, and ... had difficulty in listening to instructions."

A clinic employee testified she'd heard Nancy screaming. Clinic Director Jane Bovard's deposition said that Nancy screamed, thrashed, and hyperventilated during abortion, but, "It happens enough that I wouldn't find it cause to ask [Miks] about it." Bovard also said the employee who examined the fetus thought part of it had been retained, and Bovard spoke to Miks about this, and he responded "I clearly identified all the significant parts. I saw the calvarium. I saw the spine. I saw extremities. She does not need to be resuctioned."

Bovard also said her notes of when Nancy called said "Patient called and stated that she had just passed a head and an arm. I explained that the doctor had found all the parts and maybe it was just lining of the uterus. She said 'No. It's a head and an arm.' I said she could have had twins and we only got one. She was screaming and yelling at me and then her husband got on the phone and said he was going to 'Sue the (expletive) out of your doctor...' I reassured her she was doing OK."

A pathologist reported that the tissues Nancy expelled included "the entire face, two arms, and a portion of rib cage and back."

In defense of Miks, an attorney wrote, "The defense downplays [Nancy's] vivid descriptions. They say very few doctors examine 10-week aborted fetuses to make sure all the parts are suctioned, since the fetus is very small - approximately one inch in size."

In a deposition, an expert for the defense blamed Nancy's reaction to expulsion of the mutilated fetus on her "hysterical personality traits." The clinic also claimed that Nancy ignored instructions to wait 1/2 hour in waiting room before leaving. North Dakota Supreme Court gave a defendant verdict.

In the other suit, filed against abortionist Robert Lucy, patient "Tori" alleged that she nearly died.

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