GALVESTON — The emergency removal of part of Marvin Simmons’ skull saved his life when his brain was swelling during a stroke.

The problem is that once it was removed, he never got it back.

A lawsuit filed Wednesday in the 122^nd District Court against the University of Texas Medical Branch on behalf of the 53-year-old Galveston man claims the hospital lost the 8-inch by 4-inch piece of skull and canceled three surgeries to replace it before admitting the mistake.

In a statement, medical branch officials said they had not had an opportuni-ty to review the lawsuit.

“It is the goal of UTMB to provide to the highest quality of care to all of our patients at all times,” the statement said.

“We have not yet had the opportunity to review the specific allegations regarding this matter, and thus are unable to comment further at this time.”

Simmons had the surgery in January 2007 after a stroke.

From February until October, he had to wear a helmet to protect the portion of his head where the skull piece had been, Simmons’ attorney, Tony Buzbee, said.

Surgery was delayed for months until doctors told Simmons about the mistake, the lawsuit claims.

When he did have surgery, doctors replaced the skull piece with a piece of titanium mesh, the lawsuit claims.

“Every doctor agrees that in the long-term, it’s always much better to replace the portion of the skull that was removed,” Buzbee said.

Now, Simmons has a bulge an inch high on the right side of his head, Buzbee said.

“This is not a case for medical malpractice,” the lawsuit says.

“This is instead a case alleging carelessness, gross negligence and a breach of a medical practitioner’s fiduciary duty to the patient.”

The skull piece was supposed to be cataloged and taken to the medical branch’s bone bank, Buzbee said.

He said he worried that Simmons’ problems were “just a microcosm” of other organizational problems at the medical branch.

The lawsuit asks the medical branch for actual damages, punitive damages and court costs.

“It’s not like he’s not asking for a million dollars,” Buzbee said. “This is an issue throughout the country that needs to be fixed.”

Simmons used to operate a commercial maintenance service before the stroke.

Since then, his left arm has been partially paralyzed, and he has been unable to work.