LONE TREE, Colo. (KUSA/CNN Newsource/WKRC) – A lawsuit has been settled after a shocking revelation that a surgeon and anesthesiologist played a music bingo game during a routine eye surgery, allegedly leading to the death of a man from cardiac arrest.
Chris Reiter, Bart Reiter’s widow, recounted the day of the surgery, saying she was told there was no need to stay at the surgical center. “They said I needed to go. I could do an errand or I could do whatever, and they would call me when he was done,” she said.
The surgery, a cataract procedure, was considered routine, with nearly four million performed annually in the U.S. However, notes obtained by KUSA revealed that staff noticed abnormal vital signs 11 minutes into the surgery. By the time Bart Reiter was transferred to Sky Ridge Medical Center, his death was imminent.
An autopsy confirmed cardiac arrest as the cause of death. “It just didn’t make sense. Bart was 56. I mean, we skied every weekend. We bike together, we hike together,” said Chris Reiter.
The investigation revealed that the surgical team played a music bingo game during the procedure. Doctor Stark Johnson, the surgeon, and Doctor Michael Urban, the anesthesiologist, admitted to playing the game, which involved listening to songs on a cell phone and marking a board with song titles.
Chris Reiter learned from nurses and depositions that it was not unusual for the team to turn off audible alarms during surgeries. Doctor Johnson blamed Doctor Urban for silencing the alarms without notifying anyone. “I know that he wasn’t paying attention to the vital signs and doing his job,” Johnson said during a deposition.
Doctor Urban, through an attorney, maintained that he stands by his care and treatment of Bart Reiter and disagrees with the surgeon’s account of the events.
