Woman, 36, sues her doctors and nurse for performing unnecessary hysterectomy and double mastectomy

A 36-year-old woman is suing her healthcare providers, claiming that both of her breasts and her uterus, ovaries and fallopian tubes were removed unnecessarily.

Elisha Cooke-Moore, from Oregon, has a family history of breast cancer and decided with her doctors to undergo genetic testing.

Her lawsuit for $1.8 million, filed on Thursday, claims that her doctors recommended she go forward with a hysterectomy and double mastectomy based on their misinterpretations of her blood work.

It was only after both operations had been done that Cooke-Moore looked through her own medical charts, called the lab, and found out that her tests had been negative for the genetic indicators of cancers, she told Daily Mail Online.

Cooke-Moore, a mother-of-two in Gold Beach, Oregon, alleges that she was left with a botched breast reconstruction that has required numerous follow-up surgeries to repair in addition to coping with forced early menopause. 

'My nipples rotted, my implants were popping out, my skin was ripping,' she told Daily Mail Online. She says that her menopause began three days after the hysterectomy. 'I've been in hell ever since,' she says.    

Cooke-Moore’s mother and grandmother both had breast cancer, so she thought she was taking a proactive approach to her own health by undergoing genetic testing to find out if she had inherited a higher risk of cancer.

After consulting her gynecologist in 2015, she got tested for BRCA1 - the so-called 'Jolie gene' that led Angelina Jolie to undergo a preventative double mastectomy and hysterectomy - BRCA2, and MLH1. 

Lori Johns, a nurse, told her she carried mutations of the genes that put her at higher risk for cancers. Johns passed that information along to the doctor she referred Cooke-Moore. 

The second doctor reiterated those results and told Cooke-Moore she was at high risk for breast and uterine cancer, the lawsuit claims.

He recommended that she let him perform a hysterectomy to remove her uterus, and sent her to another doctor to have a double mastectomy as well in order to prevent cancers from developing.

In 2016, after she'd had both procedures and a reconstruction, Cooke-Moore claims she discovered that she did not in fact have any of the dangerous gene mutations. 

BRCA1 and BRCA2 are known, inherited gene mutations associated with elevated risks of cancer. 

Recent studies indicate that between 55 and 65 percent of women with the BRCA1 gene and about 45 percent of women with the BRCA2 mutation will develop breast cancer by the time they are 70, according to the National Cancer Institute. 

The MLH1 genetic mutation has received less publicity than the BRCA genes. Its presence in a woman's DNA indicates Lynch syndrome, which puts women at greater risk for developing other cancers, including colorectal and uterine cancers. 

The lawsuit Cooke-Moore filed states that MLH1 is not associated with breast cancer, though research on the gene has mixed findings. 

Cancer.org lists breast cancer as one of those associated with the gene. Some studies have found that it is not significantly connected, others have reported the MLH1 mutation puts women at a ‘moderately’ elevated risk of breast cancer.

According to the lawsuit Cooke-Moore received clean mammogram results but was told she was positive for the MLH1 gene mutation. 

Lori Johns referred her to Dr William Fitts, for additional breast cancer screening.

It is unclear how Johns, and later Fitts, misinterpreted her results.   

'Quite frankly, we are stumped to why they would make this mistake,' Cooke-Moore's lawyer, Christopher Cauble, told the Oregonian.  

According to the lawsuit, Dr Fitts told Cooke-Moore that 'her lifetime risk of breast cancer is at least 50 percent, ball bearing cancer 60-70 percent, and endometrial cancer may be as high as 80 percent.'

Speaking to Daily Mail Online, Dr Fitts said 'I got the medical literature to support what I did and we'll see how it comes out in court,' but added 'I'd love to sit down and tell everyone what happened, but that could make me look vindictive.'  

Her tests for the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes both came back negative too, in February 2016.

Still, Dr Fitts and nurse Johns continued to plan a course of treatment as though Cooke-Moore’s tests indicated she was at high risk for both breast and uterine cancer, the suit claims.

A total hysterectomy is a surgical procedure to remove a woman’s uterus, and, if necessary, the ovaries and fallopian tubes. 

It is a fairly common treatment for a number of health conditions, including fibroids - non-cancerous growths that women sometimes develop - and endometriosis.

The procedure is becoming slightly more common among younger women as a preventative measure against cancer, but women in the US are most likely to undergo hysterectomies between ages 40 and 49, in the years leading up to menopause.

The operation itself triggers menopause, and after having it done, many women have to start hormone replacement therapy.

In August 2016, when Dr Fitts allegedly performed her hysterectomy, Cooke-Moore was 35 with plenty of time before she would have naturally entered menopause.

In October 2016, Dr Jessica Carlson performed a double mastectomy on Cooke-Moore, removing all of the tissue from both of her breasts and placing implants, according to the lawsuit. 

Mastectomies are primarily a form of treatment for women with breast cancers that their doctors judge cannot be kept from spreading by removing just the tumor. Double mastectomies surgically remove all of the tissue of both breasts.

A double mastectomy is a relatively safe procedure, but it is still invasive, requires anesthesia, and comes with risks of infection, long-lasting swelling of the lymph nodes in the arms, numbness, stiffing and, of course, scarring.

In Cooke-Moore’s case, there was no cancer to remove, she claims. She believed that she was joining the small but rapidly growing ranks of women who have both breasts removed to prevent breast cancer from developing.

Cooke-Moore told Daily Mail Online that she isn't sure when she was handed the paper copy of her test results, but it wasn't until after her surgeries that she found it and called the lab to find out what the results meant. 

'I thought I was in good hands, I really did trust her,' Cooke-Moore told Daily Mail Online. 

She says that her blood pressure has since sky-rocketed, and that she's been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder. 

'It's sad because what can they give me back? Nothing. They took who I was,' she told Daily Mail Online.  

Prophylactic, or preventative, mastectomies and hysterectomies are becoming slightly more common, especially after Angelina Jolie, who is positive for the BRCA1 gene mutation, announced in 2013 that she had had both procedures done. 

Unlike Jolie, Cooke-Moore claims that her genetic test results did not show that she had inherited gene mutations that would put her at an elevated risk for breast or uterine cancer. 

'As a woman, they took what God gave me. I don’t even feel like I am one at times,' Cooke-Moore told the Oregonian.

Furthermore, the double mastectomy was supposed to save her nipples for reconstruction, but in a picture of her bare chest after her breasts were removed and replaced with implants, her nipples are barely visible on her scarred ‘reconstructed’ breasts.  

Now, Cooke-Moore is suing her doctors for medical malpractice and $1.8 million in personal damages, the maximum amount she can under Oregon tort law. 

Daily Mail Online reached out to the other parties involved in the lawsuit, but did not receive responses.

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