A second Portland-area woman claims a Kaiser Permanente doctor mistakenly injected rubbing alcohol instead of painkiller into her foot before tearing off her ingrown toenail.
In a $23 million lawsuit filed earlier this week, Judith Young says the medical mistake resulted in a chemical burn that killed the tissue in her big toe — manifested by blackened flesh — and caused her bones to fuse. Her suit says she was unable to work for months. Now, almost 10 months later, she is in chronic pain and struggles to walk, according to her lawsuit.
Young’s case follows a $13 million lawsuit filed in June by Sarah Blackman, another patient who says the same doctor at Kaiser’s Westside Medical Center in Hillsboro injected her with rubbing alcohol instead of another clear fluid, the painkiller lidocaine. Blackman’s lawsuit also says the rubbing alcohol has destroyed the tissue in two of her toes, and that she is in continual pain and has trouble walking.
Representatives from Kaiser Permanente declined to comment about Blackman’s lawsuit when it was filed earlier this year. When asked for comment on Young’s case, Kaiser spokesperson Karen Vitt emailed a statement Tuesday saying that the company will carefully review Young’s care “and take appropriate steps to address any issues identified.”
“Patient safety is our highest priority, and we take concerns about the care we provide extremely seriously,” the statement said.
The podiatrist accused of confusing rubbing alcohol with lidocaine, Colin Mizuo, has since left the company. He could not be reached for comment. Publicly available records through the Oregon Medical Board show no disciplinary action against Mizuo.
Both lawsuits describe similar circumstances: Young and Blackman separately visited Mizuo just a week apart in January 2026 to have ingrown toenails removed — Young on one of her big toes and Blackman on two of hers.
“Ms. Young was in agony throughout, audibly screamed and crying, and telling Dr. Mizuo that she was in terrible pain” and that “she could feel everything,” according to Young’s lawsuit.
Blackman’s lawsuit says that after screaming and crying when the doctor removed her first toenail, she begged him to leave her second toe alone. According to her suit, Mizuo said “she should ‘just get it over with’” and that if she didn’t hold still the needle he was using could go through her toe.” The suit says he rushed out of the clinic after the procedure.
Both women returned to the emergency room nine days after their procedures, with Young’s suit saying her foot was burning, throbbing and swollen. The suit says she was particularly worried about whether her foot would heal because she has diabetes. The suit says that with no indication in her medical file that the doctor had injected rubbing alcohol, a “perfect cellular killer,” emergency room staff diagnosed Young with an infection and sent her home with antibiotics.
But her toe “continued to deteriorate and began to turn black, ooze, and the skin began to come off,” Young’s lawsuit says.
As her tissue died over the next several weeks, Young returned to the emergency room three more times, her suit says.
Both lawsuits say the women learned about the podiatrist’s mistake five to six weeks later, when the head of the podiatry department called them.
The lawsuits say the women “endured what can only be described as torture at the hands of Dr. Mizuo and Kaiser staff.”
Young’s husband, Thomas Young, also is listed as a plaintiff in her lawsuit because Young’s injuries have “profoundly disrupted the parties’ shared daily life,” the suit says.
Tigard attorney Laura Kalur filed the two lawsuits on behalf of her clients.
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