Staff photo by Dean Shalhoup Dr. Marcus Hermansen, a Nashua pediatrician accused of medical malpractice by the parents of a former patient, listens to the proceedings on the first day of his trial in Hillsborough County Superior Court South.

NASHUA – Like all parents, “Mary Doe” and her husband were at once elated and exhausted in the hours after they welcomed their first child into the world in late June 2015.

The couple, former Nashua residents now living in Milford, was also grateful their son was born healthy and normal and “had all his parts,” said Nashua Attorney David Gottesman, who is representing the couple in a medical malpractice lawsuit that got underway Monday morning in Hillsborough County Superior Court South.

All was fine for mom, dad and baby when, about a day and a half after their son was born, their pediatrician, Dr. Marcus Hermansen, came and got him for what everyone thought would be a routine circumcision that would take about 15 minutes, according to Gottesman’s opening statement.

But by the time 40 minutes had passed, the baby’s mother testified, she and her husband had grown quite concerned and were about ready to go see what was going on when Hermansen suddenly appeared.

Staff photo by Dean Shalhoup Todd Hathaway, the lead attorney representing Dr. Marcus Hermansen in a malpractice suit accusing him of botching a circumcision procedure, addresses the jury with his opening statement Monday morning. The trial is expected to last through the week.

“Dr. Hermansen rushed in and told us he’d nicked the penis, and he called in a urologist,” she said, adding that by then, she and her husband had grown very anxious.

The mother, identified in court documents and dockets as “Mary Doe,” filed suit in early 2016 against Hermansen and Foundation Medical Partners Inc., the practice with which he’s affiliated.

The family, which is seeking unspecified damages, “are looking for nothing for themselves … they just want justice for their son,” Gottesman told the jury.

The family also is “looking for someone to take responsibility. So far, neither Dr. Hermansen or Foundation Medical Partners has accepted responsibility for these negligent actions,” Gottesman said.

Testimony is scehduled to resume Tuesday at 10 a.m. in Courtroom 4 at the Superior Courthouse. The parties estimate the trial will run for five days.

Attorney Todd Hathaway, the lead lawyer for Hermansen and the medical group, told jurors in his opening statement that once the evidence is aired and the expert witnesses testify, it will support the defense position that “there was no negligence” involved.

“The real question here is, was this some error, or a complication” during the circumcision procedure, Hathaway said.

An “unfortunate outcome,” such as in this case, “does not meet the standard for medical malpractice,” he added.

“Our position is that there was no negligence here. Dr. Hermansen followed the normal, standard technique for performing a circumcision.”

Shortly after the urologist, Dr. Gary Dunetz, repaired the child’s penis by reattaching the head of the penis, called glans, the couple brought him to Children’s Hospital in Boston, “because we wanted a second opinion,” Mary Doe testified.

Following surgery, the boy’s condition improved, both parties acknowledged Monday. “There are no functional problems with it … the issue here is a cosmetic one for his family and his doctor,” Hathaway said, referring to the boy’s penis.

Mary Doe testified that after Dunetz completed the reattachment procedure, he sketched out a diagram of his repair work.

That and dozens of other documents and photographs were projected on a series of monitors placed throughout the courtroom, the largest a roughly 50-inch one set up in front of the jury.

The sides also used the technology to show the jury and courtroom observers biographical sketches of several of the witnesses they plan to call to testify this week.

Dean Shalhoup can be reached at 594-1256, dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com or @Telegraph_DeanS.