Magomed Abdusalamov family reaches settlement for medical malpractice

The family of former heavyweight boxer Magomed Abdusalamov has officially reached a settlement with a trio of ringside doctors who examined the fighter following his 2013 bout with Mike Perez. Abdusalamov would drop a 10-round decision in that outing where he took serious punishment and would ultimately be discovered to have a serious brain bleed — no thanks to the physicians on hand, though.

Anthony Curreri, Osric King and Gerard Varlotta were the physicians named in the family’s malpractice lawsuit. Varlotta and Curreri gave Abdusalamov a post-fight examination in the locker room where they stitched a cut over his eye and then cleared him to leave the arena, only telling him to visit a doctor back home within a week to have his stitches removed and his face x-ray’d for facial fractures. Abdusalamov was reported to have complained of his head hurting at the time.

And while those doctors had an ambulance they could use in case of an emergency, the doctors obviously didn’t deem it necessary, believing that Abdusalamov didn’t need to go to the hospital that night. They were dangerously wrong. After the doctors left Abdusalamov’s locker room a fight inspector noticed blood in Abdusalamov’s urine sample, and urged him to immediately go to the hospital.

At that point Abdusalamov was captured on surveillance video vomiting on a street corner as his team tried to hail a cab. By the time Abdusalamov finally made it to the hospital he was already unconscious and a CT scan revealed a brain bleed that required emergency surgery. Abdusalamov would suffer from multiple strokes and would remain in a medically induced coma for weeks.

Now, several years later, Abdusalamov remains paralyzed on his right side and largely unable to communicate. But his attorney, Paul Epstein, shared these thoughts on the doctors finally coming to terms for a settlement agreement.

“This should’ve happened a long time ago,” added Edelstein, who said he believes the settlement resulted from the doctors realizing “we were ready for trial and they would have had to take the witness stand and answer questions under cross-examination about their actions that night [of the fight].”

Abdulsalamov’s family also settled a similar lawsuit with the New York State Athletic Commission a couple years back for their role in this disaster, where he was awarded $22 million in damages. That settlement, however, didn’t cover the ringside physician’s who worked the fight.

The terms of Abdusalamov’s current settlement with the ringside doctors involved are undisclosed.