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The family of a woman was left unable to speak has filed a medical malpractice lawsuit  against SSM Health Care-St. Louis and a local neurosurgeon for allegedly operating on the wrong side of a woman’s skull and brain.

The St. Louis Post Dispatch reports the patient, 53-year-old Regina Turner of St. Ann, was scheduled on April 4 for a “left-sided craniotomy bypass” at St. Clare Health Center in Fenton, according to a complaint filed in the Circuit Court of St. Louis County in Clayton.

Instead, she received a “right-sided craniotomy surgical procedure,” the suit alleges.

Turner now is unable to speak intelligibly, according to her Clayton-based lawyer, Alvin Wolff Jr. Once the operating team realized they had made an error, a second surgery was performed six days later on the correct side of Turner’s skull.   The St Louis Post Dispatch reports the suit accuses SSM and the neurosurgeon, identified by the paper as Dr. Armond Levy. In the suit he is identified by the initials “A.L.” with negligence and carelessness that led to a wrong-site surgery.

Kristen Johnson, an SSM spokeswoman, would only confirm that Levy is an employee of SSM Health Care with staff privileges at St. Mary’s Health Center and DePaul Health Center. She said federal patient privacy law prevents Levy from discussing the case.