October 5, 2011
Patient’s Miscarriage Gets Hospital in Trouble
It’s a sad commentary when human beings have to be reminded how to act like human beings, especially when they’re in the helping profession. Loni Hildebrandt was a 29 year old certified nursing assistant who was pregnant with her first baby. Make that two babies because she was pregnant with twins. Hildebrandt considered her pregnancy miraculous because she had infertility and was a diabetic since the age of one. Together, she and her boyfriend saved their money and obtained fertility treatments. Her mother, Jo Novtny, a nurse of 30 years was ecstatic when she saw the ultrasound of her two grandbabies but her happiness was short-lived. One day after the procedure, Hildebrandt began to bleed so they went to Sarasota Memorial Hospital in Florida.
Sarasota Memorial Hospital has an excellent maternal fetal medicine (aka high-risk obstetrics) department but Hildebrandt never made it there. She got as far as the hospital’s emergency room where she was attended to by one of its physicians. Despite repeated requests to have her blood sugar checked, Hidebrandt had to wait six hours before it was done. An ultrasound at the hospital revealed a blood clot that was causing the contractions and the ER doctor told her that he could probably save one by “suctioning the clot so the labor would stop.” According to The Herald Tribune, the physician suctioned the clot and one of the twins as well. Hildebrandt allegedly began bleeding more, passing bright red blood clots. They called for help but no one came. According to the newspaper report, a nurse put the afterbirth in a bedpan and left it near Hildebrandt’s head where she was lying. Her mother moved it and placed it under her daughter’s bed. Novtny ultimately delivered the second twin because no one else was around. The ER doctor returned to the room saw the fetus in Novotny’s hand took it from her and put it in a bucket.
Novtny states her daughter did not receive proper treatment until her personal physician arrived and remained in a pool of blood for over 10 hours. Hildebrandt’s iron count was dangerously low because of the bleeding. Her mother’s request to speak with the hospital administrator was met with no response so she wrote a letter to the governor instead. An investigation was done, gross negligence was found, the ER doctor resigned and Hildenbrandt’s nurse was cited for “lack of critical thinking skills.” The hospital will now have unannounced federal inspections in order to keep their Medicare payments. The hospital administrator issued a public apology.
Perhaps one day hospitals will do the right thing, even when no one is watching. Hopefully, Hildebrandt will become pregnant again and have a better outcome.
May 24, 2009
A Gratifying Day
- Image by kevindooley via Flickr
I really didn’t want to go work that day. I was battling the healthcare blues. Nor did I want to see my first patient.
She was big, angry and intimidated the hell out of my staff; and she wasn’t used to being up so early. She eyed me as I walked past the exam room and I had eyed her as well. My staff was considering calling security.
I entered the exam room then calmly sat down; feeling her stares piercing the back of my head. I reviewed her chart. It was complicated. And she was waiting for me to pass judgment so that she could rip me to shreds. But there would be no judgment from me that day. I had seen her anger reflected in the eyes of my own mirror. I knew what it was like to feel her pain.
Her health problems were a mile long; each one compounding the other. And her lifestyle certainly didn’t help. The first order of business was to lower her alarming blood pressure before she ended up having a stroke. She had been given five different medications in the ER; all inappropriate for a pregnant woman. Thankfully she hadn’t taken any. We called the social worker, who came right away and then we began to chisel away at her problems. She had fallen short of life’s expectations and had alienated her family, but this pregnancy had given her the courage to try again. She was not young and neither was her partner. The baby represented their second chance for redemption.
By the end of her visit, I gave her a hug. She clutched her new prescriptions with pride. She entered our clinic as an angry woman but departed with a smile. And I remembered — why I became a physician.
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