Thomas Duncan Settlement: Payout, Exclusions, and Nurse Suits

The Thomas Eric Duncan settlement was announced on November 12, 2014, one day after his family sued Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas County over the emergency room’s failure to diagnose the country’s first Ebola patient. Texas Health Resources agreed to pay Duncan’s parents and four children an undisclosed sum, waive all charges from his 11-day hospitalization, deliver a private letter of apology, and seed a memorial fund for Ebola victims in West Africa.¹²

What the Family Received

The cash portion of the deal was kept confidential. Family attorney Les Weisbrod, who represented the family without charging a fee, called it “a very good deal” and said it was “as good or better than we would have done in court.”³ He said the money would be enough to “take care” of Duncan’s mother Nowai Korkoyah, his father Jacob Duncan, and his four children.⁴

The children named in the settlement were Ellen Mai Duncan, 22; Karsiah Eric Duncan, 19; Deakiger Amos Duncan, 18; and Erica Duncan, 12.⁵

Beyond the payment, three non-monetary terms were made public:

Texas Health Presbyterian waived all charges for Duncan’s care, including the 11-day inpatient stay that ended with his death on October 8, 2014.³
Texas Health Resources sent the family a private letter apologizing for failing to diagnose Duncan at his first emergency room visit.¹
The hospital agreed to establish the Texas Health Dallas Thomas Eric Duncan Memorial Fund to assist Ebola victims in West Africa.¹

Who Was Excluded from the Settlement

Duncan’s fiancée Louise Troh was not part of the agreement. Weisbrod stated plainly that she “will not receive anything” from the settlement.⁶ Troh and Duncan were not married under civil law, though they considered themselves husband and wife under Liberian customary law and had a child together.⁷

The settlement did repay roughly $2,500 that Troh had borrowed from a member of the local Liberian community to buy Duncan’s plane ticket to Dallas. The remainder was divided among Duncan’s parents and four children.⁸

Why the Hospital Settled So Quickly

The family filed suit in the 191st District Court in Dallas County on November 11, 2014. Weisbrod announced the resolution at a press conference the next day.²⁹ By that point the hospital had already conceded the misdiagnosis publicly.

Duncan first arrived at Texas Health Presbyterian’s emergency room on September 25, 2014, with fever, headache, and abdominal pain. He told staff he had recently arrived from Liberia. The hospital diagnosed a sinus infection and sent him home with antibiotics. He returned by ambulance on September 28, and the CDC confirmed Ebola on September 30.¹⁰

Testifying before a U.S. House subcommittee on October 16, 2014, the hospital’s chief clinical officer Daniel Varga said: “We made mistakes. We did not correctly diagnose his symptoms as those of Ebola.”¹¹ The hospital had initially blamed an electronic health records “glitch” for keeping Duncan’s travel history from the treating physician, then retracted that claim and confirmed that all emergency room team members knew he had recently been in Africa. Varga apologized for the inaccurate public statements as well.¹²

Weisbrod said he believed the evidence would have met even a heightened negligence standard, pointing to Duncan’s 103-degree fever and abnormal blood work at his first visit.¹³

Why Texas Law Shaped the Outcome

Texas law made the courtroom path unattractive even with an admitted misdiagnosis. Emergency room malpractice claims in Texas require proof of “willful and wanton conduct or gross negligence” rather than ordinary negligence. The state also caps non-economic damages at $250,000 against a hospital and a separate $250,000 against doctors.⁵

Weisbrod, a former president of the American Association for Justice, called those rules “onerous” and said the settlement improved on what the family could realistically have recovered at trial under the caps.¹³ He used the case to argue publicly for removing the gross-negligence threshold for emergency rooms and raising what he called “ridiculously low” caps on pain and suffering awards.⁵

The Race and Insurance Question

Before the settlement, Duncan’s family had suggested his care was affected by race and lack of insurance. His nephew Josephus Weeks wrote in the Dallas Morning News that his uncle was “a man of color with no health insurance” sent away with antibiotics and Tylenol, asking whether the care was “ignorant, incompetent, or indecent.”¹⁴ Jesse Jackson made a similar suggestion.¹⁵ The hospital denied any disparity, saying Duncan received “the same high level of attention and care that would be given any patient, regardless of nationality or ability to pay.”¹⁶

By the time the deal was announced, Weisbrod said the family no longer believed race or insurance status had driven the errors, attributing them instead to “poor Ebola policies and procedures.”¹³

What the Memorial Fund Actually Funded

The Thomas Eric Duncan Memorial Fund did not build a hospital. By May 2015, Texas Health Resources had provided $125,000 in seed money for an endowed scholarship, managed by the Christian aid group SIM, to train doctors and nurses in Liberia. Duncan’s nephew Josephus Weeks and his sister Tupee Garsinii helped coordinate the effort. Weeks explained the choice: “You can build a hospital, but if you don’t have adequate people to staff it, it’s just going to be there looking pretty and eventually run down.”¹⁷

The Separate Nurse Lawsuits

The Duncan family settlement did not cover claims by the two nurses who caught Ebola while treating him. Nina Pham, 26, tested positive on October 12, 2014, and Amber Vinson tested positive shortly after. Both recovered.¹⁸

Pham sued Texas Health Resources in Dallas County in March 2015, alleging negligence, breach of privacy, and misrepresentation. She claimed the hospital provided virtually no Ebola training, that the only protective guidance she received came from “information her supervisor found on a Google search,” and that the hospital had used a video of her in a hospital bed for a public relations campaign without valid consent.¹⁹ The hospital argued the claims fell under workers’ compensation law. After the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas reversed a trial-court injunction in August 2016, the parties settled on October 24, 2016, days after the case had been scheduled for trial. The terms were confidential. There is no public record of Amber Vinson filing suit against the hospital.¹⁸

1
CNN. Ebola Thomas Eric Duncan Texas Settlement
2
NBC DFW. Ebola Victim’s Family, Dallas Hospital Reach Resolution
3
ABC News. Late Ebola Patient’s Fiancee Not Part of Hospital Settlement
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NBC News. Family of Ebola Victim Thomas Eric Duncan Settles With Dallas Hospital
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Miller Weisbrod. Thomas Eric Duncan Settlement
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BBC News. Thomas Eric Duncan Family Settles With Hospital
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Vanity Fair. My Spirit Took You In: Louise Troh Excerpt
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NBC DFW. Dallas Fiancée of Ebola Victim Hopes Memoir Closes Chapter
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Miller Weisbrod. Les Weisbrod Attorney Profile
10
CDC Museum. Ebola in the U.S.: Dallas
11
Texas Tribune. Dallas Hospital Apologizes for Mistakes in Ebola Care
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The Guardian. Texas Hospital Sorry for Ebola Case Errors
13
Courthouse News Service. Hospital Settles Suit on Ebola Patient Zero
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NPR. Liberians Wonder if Duncan’s Death Was a Result of Racism
15
CNN. Ebola Duncan Death Cause
16
NBC News. Ebola Patient Duncan Got High-Level Care, Hospital Says
17
KERA News. A Scholarship Fund Is Established to Remember Thomas Eric Duncan
18
Courthouse News Service. Ebola Nurse Settles Case Against Texas Hospital
19
American Journal of Nursing. First U.S. Nurse to Contract Ebola Sues Texas