A US district court judge has awarded an Air Force couple $7.5 million for a malpractice case against the family clinic at Andersen AFB, Guam. The island’s Pacific Daily News reported Aug. 22 that Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood granted the sum to Deborah Rutledge and her husband, MSgt. Thomas Rutledge, after agreeing that government employees at the clinic “were repeatedly negligent” in providing medical treatment to Deborah Rutledge. She suffers from Cauda Aquina Syndrome, a serious neurological disorder that base medical personnel failed to properly diagnose and treat during visits in July and August 2004, the judge ruled.
A new report from the Government Accountability Office calls for the Pentagon’s Chief Technology Officer to have budget certification authority over the military services’ research and development accounts—a move the services say would add a burdensome and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.
