HAMMOND | A jury awarded $4.45 million to a Highland family Friday after finding a St. Catherine Hospital emergency doctor responsible for medical malpractice, plaintiff's attorney Holly Wojcik said.

The family sued Dr. Rajeev Sareen after the Dec. 22, 2001, death of 45-year-old Roger Vuckovich, Lake Superior Court records show.

The former Inland Steel security supervisor died of an abdominal aortic aneurysm about 12 hours after being discharged from St. Catherine Hospital in East Chicago, Wojcik said.

One of Sareen's attorneys, John McCrum, declined comment Monday. The other two attorneys listed in court records could not be reached for comment.

Attorney Kathleen Maicher, who represented St. Catherine Hospital early in the lawsuit, said the hospital and a radiologist were dismissed from the civil suit after a medical review panel ruled they met the standard of care.

A St. Catherine Hospital spokeswoman confirmed Monday that the hospital was dismissed from the lawsuit in December 2005 but would not comment further. She said she did not have information on the status of Sareen's employment at the hospital.

Wojcik and attorney Barry Rooth argued Vuckovich's death could have been prevented if Sareen had ordered a CT scan to accurately diagnose Vuckovich's condition. Vuckovich was misdiagnosed as having a kidney stone, Rooth said.

The Lake Superior Court jury found Sareen responsible after about an hour of deliberations, Wojcik said. The verdict followed a five-day trial in Judge William Davis' courtroom in Hammond, court records show.

The jury awarded Vuckovich's wife, Cynthia, $2.2 million and awarded $750,000 each to his three daughters, Rooth said.

"I feel heartened that the jury understood that the care required a CT under these circumstances," Rooth said.