MAHONING COUNTY $800,000 awarded in lawsuit

Monday's verdict is the opposite of a previous jury decision in 2002.
By WILLIAM K. ALCORN
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- A jury in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court has awarded Brian Scibelli of Pittsburgh, formerly of Poland, $800,000 in a medical malpractice suit against a dentist.
Monday's verdict is the opposite of a previous jury decision in 2002 that favored the dentist, Dr. Dominic Pannunzio of Mineral Ridge. His practice is in Austintown.
Mahoning County Common Pleas Judge Maureen A. Cronin presided over both trials.
In his suit, Scibelli alleged that Dr. Pannunzio was negligent in misdiagnosing a bone-eating tumor, known as an odontogenic myxoma, as an infection caused by a wisdom tooth.
As a result, Scibelli said he lost the right half of his jawbone and has had several surgeries to repair the damage to his jaw and face and to replace teeth, and more surgeries are needed.
What happened
According to court records, Scibelli, at age 23, went to Dr. Pannunzio in October 1998 complaining of pain and minor swelling in his lower right jaw. His wisdom tooth was becoming loose and he had a pea-sized knob on the exterior of his lower right jaw.
Dr. Pannunzio took a periapical X-ray rather than a Panorex X-ray, which shows more area, diagnosed an infection caused by the wisdom tooth and prescribed antibiotics.
According to court records, Scibelli visited Dr. Pannunzio several times over the next few months because his condition was not improving and the symmetry of his face was changing, but there was no change in diagnosis.
On April 20, 1999, Dr. Pannunzio took a Panorex and noted a large cyst. He referred Scibelli to Dr. Richard S. Mayo, an oral surgeon in Boardman, who sent Scibelli to University Hospitals in Cleveland, where he was diagnosed with the nonmalignant odontogenic myxoma, which had destroyed his jaw bone.
First trial
In the first trial, the defendant's attorneys argued that even if the correct diagnosis has been made earlier, the damage had already been done, and a correct diagnosis would not have mattered. The jury agreed.
However, because one of the defendant's expert witnesses had said that additional teeth were lost because of the delayed diagnosis, Judge Cronin granted the plaintiff's motion for a new trial, which ended with Monday's verdict.
Dr. Pannunzio's attorney, Ronald M. Wilt, of the Cleveland law firm Buckingham, Doolittle & amp; Burroughs, said the verdict will be appealed to the Seventh District Court of Appeals.
Scibelli's attorney, William Hawal, of the Cleveland law firm of Spangenberg, Shibley & amp; Liber, said he was "very pleased" with the jury's verdict.