Thread: Death in Illinois ER Ruled Homicide

Sep 15, 12:58 PM EDT


Death in Illinois ER Ruled Homicide


WAUKEGAN, Ill. (AP) -- A coroner's jury has declared the death of a heart attack victim who spent almost two hours in a hospital waiting room to be a homicide.

Beatrice Vance, 49, died of a heart attack, but the jury at a coroner's inquest ruled Thursday that her death also was "a result of gross deviations from the standard of care that a reasonable person would have exercised in this situation."

A spokeswoman for Vista Medical Center in Waukegan, where Vance died July 29, declined to comment on the ruling.

Vance had waited almost two hours for a doctor to see her after complaining of classic heart attack symptoms - nausea, shortness of breath and chest pains, Deputy Coroner Robert Barrett testified.

She was seen by a triage nurse about 15 minutes after she arrived, and the nurse classified her condition as "semi-emergent," Barrett said. He said Vance's daughter twice asked nurses after that when her mother would see a doctor.

When her name was finally called, a nurse found Vance slumped unconscious in a waiting room chair without a pulse. Barrett said. She was pronounced dead shortly afterward.

Barrett said he subpoenaed records after finding discrepancies in the hospital's version of events.

It wasn't immediately clear if the ruling would lead to criminal charges. Dan Shanes, a chief of felony review for the state attorney's office, said his division needed to review the case.

Vista Medical Center spokeswoman Cheryl Maynen said the hospital, just north of Chicago, cooperated with the coroner's investigation and had also investigated the incident. She declined to comment on the homicide ruling.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/W/ ... SECTION=US

It should have been ruled a homicide, this woman should have been taken to the head of the line straight to the doctor!

Any time a person is complaining of chest pains and shortness of breath it is standard to get them in right away and hooked up to an EKG. Gross neglect that results in death is murder.

The article fails to say that the ever present problem plaguing US emergency rooms, illegal immigrants using them instead of doctors offices, is why this woman didn't receive prompt attention.

I will go one step futhur here and say the womans sex played a part of her not getting immediate medical attention. It is a proven fact that Doctors and the medical field in general fail to treat female pts having chest pains and shortness of breath, all the same classic symptoms of mycardioal infarction or heart attack, as agressively as they treat male pts with the same symptoms! It is far past time the medical field is held responsible for their poor treatment of female pts having heart attacks.

I have posted the video at Pictures Worth a Thousand Words.

mapwife wrote:

The article fails to say that the ever present problem plaguing US emergency rooms, illegal immigrants using them instead of doctors offices, is why this woman didn't receive prompt attention.

Something like that would probably be difficult for the press to prove, because I'm sure the hospital can't release the immigration status of those that were in line ahead of the heart attack victim. In other words, the press must watch what they say or risk a lawsuit. Perhaps if there is a trial by jury that information will come out. IMO, this situation certainly deserves answers, as do the people of Waukegan, Ill. This is murder and incompetence. All guilty parties, to include the receptionist, attending nurse, and duty physician that screened the womans admittance sheet, should be punished to the fullest extent of the law. If I was part of the Waukegan general public that utilized that hospital - I'd be demanding answers!!!

Maybe a good investigative reporter will get to the bottom of this (find a leak that likes cash ) and report it nationally! Did anyone bother to send this story to Lou Dobbs? Perhaps his staff will investigate it. Hopefully this isn't the last we'll here of this story, because it could happen to someone in our family next. Can you imagine the guilt the poor daughter is going through, she has to live with the knowledge that she didn't demand immediate attention be given to her mother.

nittygritty wrote:

I will go one step futhur here and say the womans sex played a part of her not getting immediate medical attention. It is a proven fact that Doctors and the medical field in general fail to treat female pts having chest pains and shortness of breath, all the same classic symptoms of mycardioal infarction or heart attack, as agressively as they treat male pts with the same symptoms!

I don't doubt what your saying, but I've never seen such a study. Could you direct me to a source? I'd be interested in seeing why an individual would be treated differently in an ER based on gender. Personally, I could see something like that happening (maybe), but I think it would be isolated to specific hospitals and physicians, because what you're talking about is discrimination based on gender and that is against the law.

Maybe there has been a study showing that women are more likely to be suffering from a case of Bon-Bon induced indigestion (only an example ), which would be reason enough to see a man complaining of heart attack symptoms first? I don't know, but there has to be more to it than men getting treated ahead of women simply because they are men.