PROVIDENCE — A jury has awarded $2 million to a Warwick man who claimed he suffered brain damage because he didn’t receive proper care after having open heart surgery at Rhode Island Hospital in 1998.

Richard T. Barrett, 59, a self-employed contractor who lived in East Greenwich at the time of the surgery, sued Rhode Island Hospital and Dr. William C. Feng, claiming he received a low amount of oxygen to his brain because of mismanaged care.

The damage erased certain memories of his children, affected his ability to form new memories, hampered his ability to make complex decisions and impaired his ability to communicate, according to his lawyer.

“Every day is a challenge for him,” lawyer Daniel P. McKiernan said.

A Superior Court jury awarded Barrett $2 million on Friday following nearly two days of deliberation and a 19-day trial before Judge Netti C. Vogel. With interest, the award could total up to $3.6 million, according to court documents.

“I believe justice was done,” Barrett said in a statement released by his lawyer yesterday. “I feel vindicated. I want to thank the jury for approaching their jobs with an open mind and for the respect they showed to the judge and to me as a fellow citizen.”

David W. Carroll, a lawyer representing the hospital and the doctor, said he plans to file a motion for a new trial, and if that is denied, he will pursue an appeal to the Supreme Court.

“The care that was given was excellent,” Carroll said. “We are exceptionally disappointed in the jury verdict. We believe there are solid grounds in favor of our appeal.”

Barrett made the news last year when he appeared before the state Senate Labor Committee during a debate over mandatory overtime at the state’s public and private hospitals.

Barrett told legislators he has a distinct memory of a small boy running around his Rhode Island Hospital bed and the tubing that connected him to the ventilator that was helping him breathe. He recalled a loud noise, a sudden feeling that something was very wrong with his body and the terrifying sense that he was going to die. He also remembered the boy calling the nurse on staff that night “Mom.”

Barrett said the nurse seemed to be a “temporary” who came on after he heard the nurses on the earlier shift talking about how many hours they had worked. At the time, McKiernan said, “There was a walkout of nurses protesting mandatory overtime,” and he said Barrett’s case was an example of how “mandatory overtime has caused a number of otherwise avoidable lapses in care.”

In his lawsuit, Barrett claimed that a nurse or another staff member brought a small child into the surgical intensive-care unit, and that the child interfered with the equipment that was helping him breathe. Also, the suit said, “This event was not recorded in Mr. Barrett’s chart.”

In their response to the lawsuit, the defendants denied “that any agent, servant or employee of the defendants brought a child to work in the surgical intensive care unit.” And, the defense said, “There is no reason to document an event that did not occur.”

The allegation of a child being in the hospital room was not pursued during the trial. When asked why it hadn’t been, McKiernan said, “It was a decision I made as a trial attorney for reasons of keeping the case streamlined, and ultimately I decided that who was there rendering the care was less significant than the quality of the care that was rendered.”

McKiernan said Barrett ended up with brain damage because of a “constellation of factors” over a three-day period at the hospital.

For example, he said Barrett was removed from a ventilator four hours after surgery and immediately became agitated, which is “a classic sign” of low oxygen. But, he said, there was no documented evidence that the problem was medically investigated, and when his agitation increased the next day, Barrett was given a sedative, which calmed him down but did nothing to improve his oxygen levels. At one point, his blood gases were not checked for 13 hours and Barrett ended up back on a ventilator, McKiernan said.

“By that time, his condition was worsening and becoming more complicated, like a boulder rolling downhill,” McKiernan said.

Feng performed coronary artery bypass grafting surgery on Barrett during the morning of Oct. 7, 1998. As the attending physician, Feng did not provide minute-to-minute care for Barrett, but he was ultimately responsible for that care, McKiernan said.

McKiernan said, “The case was well tried by my opposing counsel, David Carroll and Dennis Carley. There were a great number of very complex medical issues and a huge volume of testimonial and documentary evidence. Justice was done in this case because of the efforts of the members of the jury who dedicated themselves to the issues and took their oath very seriously.”

efitzpat@projo.com