articleA Maine woman has been awarded $17 million after a catastrophic surgical error resulted in the removal of her bladder during a procedure intended to address a benign ovarian cyst. The damages were awarded to Emily Mitchell last Thursday by a Kennebec County jury following a two-week medical malpractice trial against Northern Light Inland Hospital and Northern Light Health, according to her attorneys on Friday. According to the attorneys, Michell scheduled the surgery after imaging showed that a benign ovarian cyst had significantly increased in size. Surgeons later discovered that her bladder had been removed during the original operation, and pathology confirmed the tissue taken during the procedure was "full-thickness bladder tissue," according to her attorneys. The damage appeared irreversible, as "surgeons determined there was insufficient healthy bladder tissue remaining to reconstruct or repair the organ," according to Berman & Simmons.