Death in Los Angeles hospital exposes social crisis in US

Edith Isabel Rodriguez died on May 9th while two people called the emergency services phone number, 911, frantically trying to get her medical help. She died just outside the emergency room in Los Angeles’ King-Harbor hospital after spending hours seeking treatment for a steadily worsening condition. The entire tragedy reveals the strained and unhealthy state of social relations in America today.

The case received much media attention in recent weeks after the release of tape recordings of the 911 calls and a hospital video showing Rodriguez in the hours before her death—including segments showing a janitor mopping up around Rodriguez as she writhed in pain on the floor of the emergency room.

These recordings show that despite the best efforts of Rodriguez’s husband and the pleading of a second caller, Rodriguez received no assistance. Finally, when her pain became impossible to ignore, someone in the ER summoned the police, who proceeded to arrest Rodriguez on an outstanding warrant. Rodriguez, 43, a mother of three, died as she was being placed in a squad car at 1:50 a.m.

No doubt these images strike a common chord. How is it possible that Rodriguez died in such agony, while being completely ignored by those who were supposed to help her?

Rodriguez’s death did not elicit great media concern at first. The Los Angeles Times first reported the tragedy on June 2nd, three weeks after her death. The county coroner determined that it was accidental and due to a ruptured bowel. The body was released to her family members. She was not buried until June 12, since it took her family over a month to raise the money needed to give her a decent funeral. Indeed, if it were not for the recordings, her death would have gone the way of so many similar incidents across the country—that is, it would have been ignored.

((entire story @ link below))

http://www.inteldaily.com/?c=173&a=2475

:hug: If you care to share, was it because of inadequate care?

working magic with the rationing of health care only to those who are lucky enough to have never suffered a financial setback in their lives...

You know, they are poor because of themselves...

Why anyone can pull them selves up by their bootstraps...

Haven't they read Horatio Alger stories...

:cry:

The Edith Rodriguez story is the problem with the U.S. healthcare system in a nutshell. No other industrialized country would've allowed this murder by omission (of care) to happen.

will also kill people.
Shutting this hospital down should not be an option. It serves an indigent population. Cutting off their access to healthcare will kill people.
The city should revamp the hospital and make it a shining example of a terrible wrong that was righted.

this is it. As a Christian and a medical student I don't ever want to understand how human beings sworn and trained to help those in need could do this, could be there, walk by . . . . .

The hospital should stay open but only after the entire management structure and every. single. person. in that ER that night is fired and hung out to dry. I hope the charge nurse/director or manager responsible is sent to jail along with any and all attendings.

that had what was really considered good health coverage. The problem, was that there was a lot of pressure on PCPs to avoid expensive procedures, and tests. Anyway, this friend had been out sick for several days, due to severe pain in one of her legs.

A co-worker went to visit her one Sunday, and noticed that the leg was darker than the other, and icy to the touch. She insisted on driving my friend to the hospital ER. When her primary care physician was called in, he proceeded to scold and lecture my friend, accusing her of just wanting attention.

To make a long story short, my friend ended up having her leg amputated. Some drama queen, right? Another friend, who went to her doctor because of the way she felt, and a chronic cough, was given antibiotics and sent home, and told to go back to work. She died several months later from lung cancer.

My own beloved sister-in-law complained of chest pain, visited her primary care doctor twice, but was never x-rayed, and diagnosed with a "pulled muscle." My brother lost his wife, whom he loved with all of his heart, to viral pneumonia a few days later.

These are all people who had supposedly good insurance, but who suffered the consequences of having their HMOs decide what tests the doctors could, or could not order. In my own case, after suffering with extreme pain in my neck and shoulder for several months, and having my doctor ok having X-rays, but nothing else, ended up having surgery to repair two ruptured discs in my neck, and ending up with permanent nerve damage. I now have worsening tremors in both hands, and am in chronic pain.

Our system of health care is broken. In every example I've given, every person, including myself, had health insurance. What good does it do, though, if the HMO or PPO penalizes doctors if they actually order the tests, or procedures that their patients really need?

If France, and England, and Canada, and even Cuba can do it, why can't the U.S.?

but;

Since Christmas I have had three bad lung infections.

Treated twice with anti-biotics.

Referred by my GP to a Lung Specialist.

Got a CT scan that revealed moderate emphysema

Plus my right testicle decided to take a nostalgic
trip up the ol' inguinal canal. Effect? Undescended
testicle, risk of testicular cancer if not surgically
corrected.

Total cost of diagnosis and treatment including two
ultra-sounds a chest X-Ray and a CT scan in the last
four months was ZERO dollars. Waiting period for each
scan was two weeks also free of charge. My GP is four
blocks away and my hospital is two blocks away in
downtown Vancouver. Oh BTW the surgery for the undescended
testicle will also be free.

Every patient who presents themselves to ER must be
treated BY LAW whether they have paid their premiums
or not. In fact if a patient arrives by ambulance the
Paramedics must stay with the patient until a doctor
signs them into care. Failure to do so results in the
private ambulance company losing its license.

Yes we do pay for medical insurance but it is subsidized
through taxation and no private companies are allowed to
offer medical insurance in Canada.

I feel pain in my heart for the shitty treatment Americans
get from private insurers. US insurers are guilty of fraud,
and culpable negligence that in many cases constitutes
manslaughter or in US parlance, 2nd degree murder.

sorry for your recent health troubles, but glad your care has been good, quick and close to home.

Being transgender with a psych history and excruciating back pain I was treated one way.And a patient with excruciating back pain,not mentioning the psych,I was treated a different way.


When I went in with just back pain the hospital was respectful and was quick to give me medicine to STOP the pain, morphine.Didn't like the morphine,don't like the idea of taking it,it freaks me out, but the pain was worse so I put up with the morphine.They made extra sure I was not in pain. They put a nurse call thing in my hand.They spoke at length with me, asking how I felt,and getting me pillows and a sip of juice, giving me anti nausea meds,They did not force me to remove my binder. The transgender issue was respected they called me sir.I was out in like 3 hours and took the bus home the pain was under control.They gave me a few pain pills and anti nausea pills to take home if it flared up again. I was very thankful.

The second time I went to the same ER,like a month later it was dramatically different. Because I told triage I was suicidal and I was in horrible pain(back again) and my gum had a big abscess(the tooth has been pulled since).I was treated VERY differently.
If you have a psych history you are not treated like other patients.You are disrespected, your pain is ignored or minimized and you are not helped really. If you need water you must wait for the nurses to figure you might need something,for there is no nurse call button in the holding rooms for psych.You basically are abandoned there.And you are told you cannot leave the room.

I was stressed out because a ten year relationship was going to shit fast.Because I was depressed and such I presume they thought my back pain wasn't really pain. But it was in pain as bad as the first time .

Although I could barely move,I They treated me like dirt in the ER once it was known I was"crazy".I was in there a very long time.With no help for pain. I spent hours left alone in the room. Nobody came around.I was having abreactions and crying and trying to cope with the pain. Having trauma flashbacks.Abandoned in a white room is a HUGE trigger for me for I had been tortured in white isolation rooms.I did my best to contain it.They took away my clothes and my coping mechanisms, my drawing pad and mechanical pencil.They made me remove my binder which made me intensely uncomfortable being a trans person.They kept calling me she. They really were callous about my transgender situation and I was humiliated and treated like a monster there.

And it was awful being ignored for hours on end dealing with the kind of issues I was dealing with. It just made me feel like killing myself all the more. After 5 hours of intense pain,all they gave me for my back pain was a tylenol which did nothing.

Hell I could've took an OTC tylenol at home.They did not give me a stronger pain killer at all.or even offer it. Why? Because I was in a second class status (psych)I was depressed therefore any physical complaints I had would not be considered real enough to warrant real pain medicine.That is what their actions spoke to me and it pissed me off.

The mobile treatment team spoke with me, after being in the little er room isolated all day, just to get me to sign an admissions paper. She could not tell me which hospital she would be admitting me to,I was terrified of going into a psych ward especially sheppard pratt again. Because they tortured me there.I cannot trust them. I spent years in that snake pit.It was so bad of an experience I never want to go back there the thought alone triggers me.Sheppard is not safe to me.I told the lady this but she ignored me.So to triggered to trust them after these brush offs about issues I know would re-traumatize me I didn't sign the admissions form.I wanted to find out WHERE I was going first. No they didn't bother to ask what was going on with me,nothing,it was just sign the paper or shut up.

Immediately upon not signing,fast enough for the cranky lady who was working mobile treatment(she was from Sheppard BTW and she triggered me, yet at that time I was unaware of why she was so frightening and familiar)..I was discharged..with nothing done. By than it was night.I came to the ER at around 9 am..

As I walked around in the cold to the front entrance I saw where the hospital had a construction site with sharp metal rusted steel poles sticking upright out of the concrete slab every foot. Poles to support forms ready for cement to be poured later.And I tried to break into the construction area to throw myself off the nine story high half constructed part parking garage down to the slab with the poles.I was seeking to jump and impale myself.I could not break into the construction site.Climbing the fence made my back seize up so I had to let go. Could not squeeze under the fence or though it. I spent two hours scanning the site. I gave up, went home.Luckily I had ten bucks on me,I could pay for a cab home. I didn't feel safe at home I had told the nurses this. I just desperately needed a friend I could talk to. I have no friends out here because of the car apartheid one faces living in the sprawl, being poor and with no car.

At home I found I didn't have enough sleep inducing pills to do anything except maybe make me sick.If I was gonna die I wanted to make sure it would not fuck it up. I have tried before and it is pretty difficult to kill your own body. I gave up. Eventually I fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.

When I got in the door my ex was yelling at me,totally oblivious to the pain I was dealing with. I felt no one wanted to help. That I didn't matter..if it meant just listening.So I remained paralyzed in bed in a fugue state of some sort for a day or so.Then the worst of the emotional pain passed. That was when I had clearly made a decision that my ex should leave.

If at the hospital they would have helped the back pain first than spoke with me,like a person they could have helped alot.

Note to anyone with a psych history and a physical problem, that causes severe pain.(I have degenerative disc disease and was going through neuralgia which hurts a LOT if it's kicking.. So if you have physical pain taking you to the ER and emotional pain, hide the emotional pain until you get the physical pain stopped. Than while they are still assuming you are a human being, talk to them about your issues..Don't divulge history unless they ASK.

So this leads me to wonder did the lady who died of a ruptured bowel have a psych history? Did she tell the ER at any time she had any psych issues?
If so, I don't doubt the ER staff ignored her situation and blew her off like that. I got uncomfortably close to living her sort of story ,myself.