A man dies after leaving the ER

Should’ve at least done a set of cardiac enzymes. In the US, he would have been admitted for sure:

Mr Wade left hospital at 5.05pm but because of traffic and a detour to drop off another patient, it was 5.50pm by the time he got home. Miss Wade said by then he was quite breathless. He had some food but his condition deteriorated and an ambulance was called. Mr Wade was dead by the time the paramedics arrived.
Dr Moynadin Shaikh was on duty in accident and emergency when Mr Wade was brought in. He said tests showed his blood gases were fine and an ECG was also fine.

Comments

Anonymous
Don’t be so sure that in the US he would have been admitted!
shadowfax
Ummm. . . Dog bites man. Why is this news? He was 91! Guess what happens to 91 year-olds? They go to heaven!
I don’t know why this was a news story at all. The article is too vague to interpret what actually took place. Did the doc fail to notice the patient’s severe CHF? Did the patient have an ongoing or impending MI? Did the patient look fine and have a sudden dysrhythmia? We’ll never know.
I’ve sent home *plenty* of 91 year olds. Granted, they almost always get the million-dollar work-up before they go. Some of them die subsequently. And I feel bad I I was the last one they saw before they die. But we are all mortal and I don’t think it’s unconscionable that a very elderly individual dies after a medical evaluation.
Charity Doc
For goodness sakes! The man was 91 years old. For argument purposes, let’s say that he was admitted and did rule in by enzymes for AMI. Would the cardiologists cath him and put in stents? Would the CT surgeons crack his sternum and perform a CABG? Likely not. They would all watch him and say Ahh, he’s 91, he’s had a good life. Continue aspirin, beta blocker, heparin, etc…
Anonymous
Well you never know what family will come out of the woodwork and their is always a lawyer to look at the case.
Anonymous
4:53 is right,
Family frequently wants to torture demented loved one all the time with procedures, chemo, caths and CABGs, dialysis, ventilators and then want to raise hell when inevitable death (bad outcome) that has been artificially delayed actually happens.
Anonymous
anon 9:48, your the demented one. No one wants to “torture” their loved ones.
Anonymous
“No one wants to “torture” their loved ones.”
Are you for real?
Have you ever seen a prolonged code on someone with end-stage dementia? How about a man in a vegetative state for over twenty years who comes in like clockwork every couple months septic and hypotensive the wife wants everything. We turn him around and back to the nursing home. (PS: he is on our state’s version of long term care, in a care facility and the wife collects monthly checks). Or, how about the plethora of severely ill nursing home patients whose families don’t give a damn about them and then suddenly when they are sick want to be inappropriately aggressive based on guilt. You see this and then we will talk about families “torturing” their “loved” ones.
Anonymous
And though they don’t count as “loved ones” lets not forget the legal time-honored “torture” by those incapacitated and unlucky enough not to have family to make decisions for them. Yes you guessed it….county fiduciaries. No matter how inappropriate…do everything just in case somebody shows up from the woodwork. I don’t know about you by our county fiduciary has the balls the size of a gerbil. flog flog flog.
Anonymous
“No one wants to “torture” their loved ones.”
How wrong you are. Obviously you do not work in a hospital. No one WANTS to be tortured but family members are WILLING to torture and prolong an agonizing existence in their demented loved one. I work in that world. You live in a dream world.
Anonymous
“Obviously you do not work in a hospital”
Think again :[
“No one WANTS to be tortured but family members are WILLING to torture and prolong an agonizing existence in their demented loved one. I work in that world. You live in a dream world.”
Given what we do at times I think the better word is “nightmare”.
Dr John Crippen
Kevin, this one strikes home for me – because I was born and brought up in Accrington (which, incidentally has the most famous football team in the world, Accrington Stanley. Yes, it really is called that)
Who knows what really happened? To be fair, nowhere in the article does it say that cardiac ezymes were NOT done; the coroner, who would be medically qualified, did not say that they were not done, and would surely have commented specifically if they had not been, and a verdict of death by natural causes was brought it.
I can tell you the the Lancashire Evening Telegraph is not The Times, and most certainly is not a paper of record.
So, it might have been a mess up, but also, it might not have been. And given that the court said it was natural causes, it would be fair to go with that.
He might well have been admitted to a hospital in the USA – and died a few hours later leaving a bill of $16,000 for his family.
Let’s not oversimplify, or jump to conclusions.
John
Anonymous
1. You CAN tell quite a bit from this article. This would never have happened in the present-day United States. The doctor says that he would have admitted the patient if he had “more fluid in his lungs”! Is there anyone out here who would not admit a 91-year-old fart with chf for romi? In order to protect yourself you have to do it…every medical student knows that when someone is diagnosed with chf, you have to look for a reason, either dietary indiscretion, noncompliance with meds, or MI! Are you going to gamble your career on the fact that he ate too much chinese take-out and ignore the possibility of MI?
2. Regarding all this torture discussion, why are you guys complaining? We get paid for torturing these fucks…and we are protected for doing everything; none of us would do it to ourselves or our family members, but what difference does it make if we do it to the litigious assholes in this country? Just keep collecting the pay, keep mum, and give the assholes in this country what they deserve!
Anonymous
“We get pay for torturing these fucks!”
“None of us would do it to ourselves or our families, but what difference does it make if we do it to these litigious assholes?”
“Give the assholes in this country what they deserve.”
It’s “your” profession this guy represents. Please don’t act so shocked, when you stop getting the respect you so adamantly believe you deserve.
Anonymous
Who says he represents the medical profession? All I can tell is that he/she is a deranged people hating, self hating, life hating, mentally disturbed individual that owns a computer, who hopefully will get caught on on Dateline NBC’s “To Catch a Pervert”

A man dies after leaving the ER

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