A woman was left with no legs after surgeons are alleged to have mistakenly amputated her healthy limb instead of her cancer-plagued right one in a botched operation
A woman has been left with no legs after a surgeon allegedly amputated her healthy left leg instead of her right one in a horrific medical blunder. Sharon Jacks is taking legal action after a planned below-the-knee operation to remove her cancer-plagued right limb went disastrously wrong.
According to a 32-page lawsuit filed by Jacks and her lawyer Brad Layne, the operation was a “complete failure of basic patient safety procedures and represented a never event under accepted healthcare standards.”
Sharon Jacks, from Ohio, US, had been scheduled to have her diseased right leg removed in September 2025 at at Selby General Hospital. But the surgical team accidentally removed her healthy left leg instead, the lawsuit claims.
Her attorney, Brad Layne, slammed the medical staff involved in a scathing statement regarding the lawsuit. “Wrong limb amputation should never happen,” Layne said. “There is simply no excuse. Complete and total failure by multiple medical professionals caused this catastrophe.
“Despite several opportunities to identify the mistake and stop the procedure, the surgical team somehow never noticed they were operating on the wrong leg.”
He added: “Now every day for the rest of her life, Sharon Jacks must live with the consequences of those failures,” according to Fox 8.
The legal action states that Jacks “has suffered severe physical injury, permanent disability, pain and suffering, emotional distress, humiliation, loss of enjoyment of life, medical expenses and other damages.”
Layne, who is alleging gross negligence, revealed that the surgeon had actually marked the correct leg before the operation took place. The pre-surgery mark was still visible on her right leg even after the wrong limb had been cut off.
The lawsuit lists several co-defendants, including Selby General Hospital, Marietta Memorial Hospital, Marietta Area Health Care Inc., Marietta Health Care Physicians Inc. and First Settlement Orthopedics Inc., alongside a number of individual doctors.
Selby General Hospital addressed the tragic error in a statement to WBNS, saying: “We are saddened by what occurred, and our team continues to keep this patient and their family in our prayers. Our expected operating room procedures were not followed.”
The hospital also confirmed that the medical staff involved are “no longer in their positions,” though they did not elaborate further, according to Cleveland.com.