Woman dies in ER lobby as 911 refuses to help

[Averagesupernova]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19207050/?GT1=10056

I can't imagine.

 

[Math Is Hard]

This is the same hospital that was formerly King/Drew. It has an extremely bad reputation. We used to hear horrible stories about it all the time on the news.

Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital (MLK-Harbor), formerly known as Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center (King/Drew), is a public hospital in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, but the hospital is located in unincorporated Willowbrook, California.

MLK-Harbor is operated by the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services (DHS) and has 48 beds. In recent years, widely publicized problems related to incompetence and mismanagement caused the hospital to undergo a radical overhaul: bringing the number of beds down to 42 from 233.[1] Since 2004, 260 hospital staffers, including 41 doctors, had been fired or had resigned as a result of disciplinary proceedings.

 

[MeJennifer]

That hospital has a history of severe problems.
But due to political correctness, since it is a "black" hospital, people rather look the other way.

This hospital needs to be closed immediately!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Did you all see the story last night about the guy who was beaten by a paramedic for refusing treatment?

 

[Evo]

Did you all see the story last night about the guy who was beaten by a paramedic for refusing treatment?

Are these people snapping from the stress?

 

[picklefeet]

Woman dies in hospital when nurses refuse help

Did you hear about that woman who was at Martin Luther King Jr. Harbor Hospital? She collapsed on the ground and proceeded to vomit blood while the nurses stood by and watched. No one helped her! It's a disgrace. A perfect example of gross negligence.

 

[G01]

This story is absolutely ridiculous. There were so many people shirking their duties in this situation, it's disgusting. How is this hospital...well, still a hospital and not an abandoned building?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Are these people snapping from the stress?

I don't know about these particular situations but emergency medicine is no walk in the park. Not everyone who goes into that line of work can take it; in fact most of us couldn't. People resond to the horror of it all in any number of ways including treating the patients like cattle, or with disdain, or rarely even with hatred. And in the inner cities, in places like MLK in Watts, or USC med center in LA, places where I have worked, it is a damned ugly scene much of the time. The people who can do this work and still care [like my wife] are indeed very special people.

 

[Moonbear]

That hospital has a history of severe problems.
But due to political correctness, since it is a "black" hospital, people rather look the other way.

This hospital needs to be closed immediately!

How is it politically correct to look the other way and let people die? Sounds rather racist to say, "Oh, it's a black hospital, it's okay if they die," doesn't it?

This story is absolutely ridiculous. There were so many people shirking their duties in this situation, it's disgusting. How is this hospital...well, still a hospital and not an abandoned building?

I agree. It sounds like the doors should simply be boarded up if someone writhing in pain and vomiting blood is just sitting in a waiting room in an ER.

I think if I'd have been there and the paramedics said they couldn't provide transport to another hospital because she's already at a hospital and it was under those conditions, I'd have helped carry her out to the sidewalk so she was no longer at a hospital just so that 911 would have to respond and take her somewhere else.

 

[Moonbear]

People resond to the horror of it all in any number of ways including treating the patients like cattle...

Hey! Those of us with 4-legged patients take much better care of them than that! People would WISH they were treated like cattle (or sheep) when in the hospital.

 

[MeJennifer]

How is it politically correct to look the other way and let people die? Sounds rather racist to say, "Oh, it's a black hospital, it's okay if they die," doesn't it?

I think you did not understand my comments at all.

I suggest you inform yourself about the history of this hospital, how it started and the endless list of problems it had and why it is still no closed.

 

[Moonbear]

I think you did not understand my comments at all.

Obviously not, because I can't see how your statement makes any sense as being politically correct.

I suggest you inform yourself about the history of this hospital, how it started and the endless list of problems it had.

I have an idea from this thread, and really don't see the need to go "informing myself" of any more of it. I don't care what its history is other than if they have a history of endangering people's lives with negligence, then they should be shut down NOW.

 

[FredGarvin]

Did you all see the story last night about the guy who was beaten by a paramedic for refusing treatment?

He actually was sick at first and that's when he called the EMS. He started to feel better but it was too late to call off the ambulance. The EMT that beat him committed suicide the very next day. The man is suing his estate. There was something very wrong with that individual. Unfortunately, that sick person got the wrong EMT on the wrong night.

 

[picklefeet]

This story is absolutely ridiculous. There were so many people shirking their duties in this situation, it's disgusting. How is this hospital...well, still a hospital and not an abandoned building?

I have a problem with this. A lot of the blame lies on the government, local and federal, who don't give enough funding for hospitals to hire and train doctors and nurses. I also think that it may have something to do with race and poverty. If this hospital was in Beverly Hills, the hospital would have more funding than it needed and the doctors would be from the top of their respective classes.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

The name of the hospital has changed from MLK, to MLK-Drew, to MLK-Harbor. I didn't realize that this is the same MLK in Watts where I worked.

Yeah, that is one really bad place. This lies in the heart of Watts, which is famous for the Watts riots in the sixties. It is, or at least was one of the most dangerous areas around Los Angeles. A cop once told me that I was a fool to be working in that area without a gun.

I saw last night that as this woman was dying, the janitor was cleaning up the blood and vomit but did nothing to get help. Unbelievable!

A doctor once told me that this is the last place he would want to be as a patient, unless he was shot or stabbed. ER docs at MLK see this as much as anyone - every day. In fact it was an experience at MLK that convinced me not to go into medicine. I was working on CT scanners and considering getting an MD, but one day I had to help with a patient at MLK. It was a young girl - about age fifteen or sixteen - who had been shot in the face with a shotgun at point blank. I had seen a lot of bad things before, but that was it for me and a medical career.

 

[cronxeh]

Did you all see the story last night about the guy who was beaten by a paramedic for refusing treatment?

AHAHAHAH

sorry, man..

 

[Math Is Hard]

End of the road for King-Harbor:
http://www.dailybruin.com/news/2007/aug/20/king_harbor_hospital_shutting_down/

Published: Monday, August 20, 2007

Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital, which was placed under the control of a UCLA-affiliated hospital last year in an attempt to improve its quality of care, failed a final federal inspection and will close its doors within the next two weeks, county officials announced last week.

The South L.A. hospital failed a “make-or-break” patient care inspection in July, and as a result King-Harbor hospital lost nearly $200 million in annual federal funding, a sum that represents nearly half its yearly budget.

Last Monday, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors announced that it would close the hospital indefinitely.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Here's a story I heard from a woman I met recently about a San Diego Hospital:

She and her friends were assaulted by a gang of thieves at the beach, each of them punched several times. The paramedics duct taped her to a board and brought her to the emergency room. When they found out she had no insurance they left her there for two hours unattended.

She told a passing person to get a nurse when she eventually had to pee. A nurse came, pulled her jeans down to her knees, then left, presumably to get a bed pan, but never came back. Eventually she couldn't hold it and let go. The nurse came back, castigated her for her weakness, then wheeled her to x-ray, covered in pee, with her jeans still pulled down, in full view of everyone. The x-ray technician was astonished and baffled, but to the best of her knowledge nothing happened to the nurse.

Not life threatening, but, really, what the hell is wrong with these medical people??

 

[Evo]

Here's a story I heard from a woman I met recently about a San Diego Hospital:

She and her friends were assaulted by a gang of thieves at the beach, each of them punched several times. The paramedics duct taped her to a board and brought her to the emergency room. When they found out she had no insurance they left her there for two hours unattended.

She told a passing person to get a nurse when she eventually had to pee. A nurse came, pulled her jeans down to her knees, then left, presumably to get a bed pan, but never came back. Eventually she couldn't hold it and let go. The nurse came back, castigated her for her weakness, then wheeled her to x-ray, covered in pee, with her jeans still pulled down, in full view of everyone. The x-ray technician was astonished and baffled, but to the best of her knowledge nothing happened to the nurse.

Not life threatening, but, really, what the hell is wrong with these medical people??

I don't get what ambulance company would send out paramedics with boards and duct tape instead of stretchers, how did they get her into the ER if not on a stretcher? I've never heard of that. Did they then put the board on a stretcher? The stretcher would have straps.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I don't get what ambulance company would send out paramedics with boards and duct tape instead of stretchers, how did they get her into the ER if not on a stretcher? I've never heard of that. Did they then put the board on a stretcher? The stretcher would have straps.

I think they strapped her to the board because they couldn't get a stretcher on wheels onto the beach. Having taped her to the board, they simply laid the board on a stretcher in the ambulance and wheeled her into the hospital that way.

 

[Hanae4fun]

That hospital makes me sick

 

[Evo]

I think they strapped her to the board because they couldn't get a stretcher on wheels onto the beach. Having taped her to the board, they simply laid the board on a stretcher in the ambulance and wheeled her into the hospital that way.

You'd think they'd have a body board with them.

 

[zoobyshoe]

You'd think they'd have a body board with them.

Why?

http://www.dkimages.com/discover/previews/1051/90072024.JPG

 

[Evo]

Why?

http://www.dkimages.com/discover/previews/1051/90072024.JPG

A body board, perhaps they're called spinal boards, not a boogie board.

 

[zoobyshoe]

A body board, perhaps they're called spinal boards, not a boogie board.

That thing the kid has is called a "body board". Google > images > body board.

The medical thingy with the handles for carrying a person is the thing they duct taped the woman to, not some random board they found on the beach. The point was to immobilize her head, she said.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Boogie Board is a brand name. They pioneered the first high performance bodyboards.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Boogie Board is a brand name. They pioneered the first high performance bodyboards.

That explains it.

I should think you or Tsu would know the correct name of the boards paramedics strap people to when they pull them out of canyons and other places that aren't stretcher accessible.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I think they're called backboards, but I'll check with Tsu.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I think they're called backboards, but I'll check with Tsu.

That's it:

http://www.pullman-wa.gov/content/WYSIWYG/Fire/2006EMSWeekFranklin/2006EMSWeekFranklinKeetonBackboardStraps.jpg

 

[zoobyshoe]

Where did that incendiary post go? Was it deleted by the poster or by a mentor?

 

[Evo]

Where did that incendiary post go? Was it deleted by the poster or by a mentor?

I deleted it.

 

[Gokul43201]

Here's a similar incident, but more shocking.

NEW YORK (AP) -- City hospital officials said they were shocked by surveillance footage showing a woman falling from her chair, writhing on the floor and dying as workers failed to help for more than an hour.

Esmin Green, 49, had been waiting in the emergency room for nearly 24 hours when she toppled from her seat at 5:32 a.m. on June 19, falling face down on the floor.

She was dead by 6:35, when someone on the medical staff, flagged down by a person in the waiting room, finally approached, nudged Green with her foot, and gently prodded her shoulder, as if to wake her.

The staffer then left and returned with someone wearing a white lab coat who examined her and summoned help.

Until the staffer's appearance, Green's collapse barely caused a ripple. Other patients waiting a few feet away didn't react. Security guards and a member of the hospital's staff appeared to notice her prone body at least three times, but made no visible attempt to see if she needed help. Video Watch the surveillance video »

One guard didn't even leave his chair, rolling it around a corner to stare at the body, then rolling away a few moments later.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/07/01/hospital.death.ap/index.html

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Cripes, what is wrong with people?

I used to spend a lot of time as USC medical center, and it was crazy! I can see how people just get overwhelmed. Anyone who doesn't think that our health care system is in crisis should spend a day at an inner-city hospital.

 

[Moonbear]

I don't think I'd extrapolate that the entire health care system is in crisis because of problems at inner city hospitals. There definitely are problems with the inner city hospitals, and mainly with too few staff and rooms to handle too many patients, but that's a problem with everything in inner cities...too many people and too few resources all crammed into one place.

It sounds like this example is something far worse though. This sounds like a hospital that somehow has developed an entire culture of negligence. When they're describing everything from docs falsifying medical records to cover up negligence, security guards who ignore problems in the waiting room, maintenance staff who don't clean bathrooms, etc., that tells me the problem starts at the top...administrators and human resources are not stepping into correct problems and fire staff when needed, until something like this receives media attention.

 

[NeoDevin]

administrators and human resources are not stepping into correct problems and fire staff when needed, until something like this receives media attention.

I think part of the problem is that they simply can't fire people. They are far too short staffed to meet demand as it is. From their point of view crappy help is better than no help at all.

 

[Moonbear]

I think part of the problem is that they simply can't fire people. They are far too short staffed to meet demand as it is. From their point of view crappy help is better than no help at all.

Again, that's a sign of bad management. Having such bad staff will only make it harder to hire new staff. Anyone competent would take one look at a place like that and run! The only way to change something that bad is from the top down, change the administrators and then convince potential new employees that the administration is changed to fix the problems they are seeing and they are being hired to help fix the problem not continue to put up with it.

 

[moose]

That's it:

http://www.pullman-wa.gov/content/WYSIWYG/Fire/2006EMSWeekFranklin/2006EMSWeekFranklinKeetonBackboardStraps.jpg

[/URL]

HAHA they both look so happy!

 

[Gokul43201]

Cripes, what is wrong with people?

I don't know...here's another story:

RALEIGH, North Carolina (AP) -- A mental patient died after workers at a North Carolina hospital left him in a chair for 22 hours without feeding him or helping him use the bathroom, said federal officials who have threatened to cut off the facility's funding.

The state sent a team Tuesday to help Cherry Hospital in Goldsboro draft new procedures to ensure patients receive proper care.

An investigator's report released Monday found that 50-year-old Steven Sabock died in April after he choked on medication and was left sitting in a chair for close to a day at the facility about 50 miles southeast of Raleigh. Surveillance video showed hospital staff watching television and playing cards a few feet away.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/08/19/patient.death.ap/index.html

 

[JasonRox]

I don't know...here's another story:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/08/19/patient.death.ap/index.html

I heard he wasn't insured. Too bad.

 

[edward]

I'll use this spot to post and update on this story:

Reports of homeless dumping prompted investigation
The investigation was sparked in 2006 by a Los Angeles police investigation of reports that hospitals were dumping homeless patients on the streets.

The investigation turned up something quite different than just homeless people being dumped on the street.

The hospitals involved had been recruiting homeless people to scam medicaid.

LOS ANGELES - A hospital CEO was arrested Wednesday in what authorities said was a scheme to recruit homeless people as phony patients and bill government programs for millions of dollars in unnecessary health services.

Federal agents raided three medical centers and the city of Los Angeles sued the hospitals, saying they used homeless people as "human pawns."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26061635/