Free Republic

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a sweeping federal lawsuit against the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops over its ethical guidelines for Roman Catholic hospitals, arguing the directives were to blame for negligent care of a pregnant woman who went into early labor and whose baby died within hours.The ACLU alleges the bishops were negligent because their religious directives prevented Tamesha Means from being told that continuing her pregnancy posed grave risks to her health and her child was not likely to survive. She was treated at Mercy Health Muskegon, a Catholic hospital in Michigan."It's not just about one woman,"...

(CNN) -- Gail Sandidge rushed to help when screams rang out during a stabbing at a Texas medical center on Tuesday. Horrified patients and family members watched as a man stabbed the nurse in the chest. "She was just saying...'I'm hurt. He got me,'" witness Jana Jackson told CNN affiliate KLTV. "And that's when we realized there was blood all on the front of her scrubs." Hours later, authorities pronounced Sandidge dead. Police said four others were wounded when 22-year-old suspect Kyron Templeton attacked visitors and employees Tuesday morning at Good Shepherd Ambulatory Surgical Center in Longview, Texas. The hospital's...

Before undergoing an MRI, a CT scan or a surgery to clean up that wobbly knee, consumers had better become accustomed to hearing: "How do you intend to pay for that?"... The shift comes as more consumers enroll in so-called high-deductible health plans, which require consumers to pay more out of pocket in exchange for lower monthly premiums. As a result, health care providers must collect a larger portion of patient bills from consumers themselves, rather than their insurance companies. It's a delicate balance for hospitals, which have certain legal and ethical obligations to care for people who arrive with...

Hospital Ship Activates to Support Typhoon Relief Mission From a U. S. Pacific Fleet News Release PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii, Nov. 14, 2013 – The commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet yesterday directed the activation of USNS Mercy to prepare the hospital ship for possible deployment to the Philippines. USNS Mercy off the coast of the Philippines during a Pacific Partnership deployment, July 1, 2012. U.S. Navy photo Petty officer 3rd Class Michael Feddersen  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Navy Adm. Harry B. Harris Jr. directed the activation to accelerate Mercy's ability to attain full operating status in case it’s...

TULSA, Oklahoma - Police are searching for a burglar who was shot multiple times. He was caught in the act by a homeowner, who showed no mercy. The burglar was taken to the hospital on October 12, but now he's essentially disappeared. Police have already arrested one man for the burglary and now they're searching for Michael Watts. The homeowner who shot Watts said it's a shame that Watts broke into his house looking for gold and left full of lead. (snip) Watts had surgery and disappeared. Now, detectives have issued an arrest warrant for him. "The problem with burglary...

SIERA VISTA — Going to a hospital emergency room is traumatic for most, but when a person is a victim of a sexual assault, it is even more psychologically and physically painful. Wednesday, Maj. Gen. Robert Ashley came to the Sierra Vista Regional Health Center to thank those who work in the hospital emergency department. He had a two-fold mission, one to express his appreciation for the service provided to Fort Huachuca soldiers and military families when they have a medical emergency, and to express his personal gratitude to a nurse who helped a female soldier make it through the...

SIERRA VISTA — Military leaders on Fort Huachuca are looking forward to the construction of the new 100-bed Sierra Vista Regional Health Center, the ground-breaking for which will be held at 4 p.m. on Oct. 16. After Wednesday’s ceremony honoring the hospitals’s emergency department’s staff, Maj. Gen. Robert Ashley said it’s addition to the local communities, military and civilian, will improve health care for everyone. It was some years ago when the post hospital functions were changed to be a health center, meaning soldiers and their families have to go to civilian hospitals for care beyond what the Raymond W....

As the new St. Joseph’s Hospital in Highland, Ill., prepared to open in August, its chief executive exulted, “You feel like you could be at the Marriott.” In the $63 million community hospital, patients all enjoy private rooms, with couches, flat-screen TVs and views of nature. Its lobby features stone fireplaces and a waterfall. Some hospitals in the United States, like Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles, have long been associated with deluxe accommodations, and others have always had suites for V.I.P.’s. But today even many smaller hospitals often offer general amenities, like room service and nail salons, more often associated with...

Well, I sure screwed it up today… I went to sit down on a chair that wasn't there and fell, now I can't move my legs and the ER released me saying nothing is broke so there is nothing they can/will do. No brace, no chair, no crutches, nothing. The doctor didn't even touch me, tell me to wiggle toes, take my temp, listen to my heart, nothing...just a CT scan and then let me go. I couldn't even get in the car without a nurse, 2 cops and a citizen who offered to help. I don't know what to...

A local hospital is closing its doors. Wellmont Health System is citing unprecedented changes in health care as the reason for closing Lee Regional Medical Center. Company officials say three reasons led to the decision reimbursement cuts associated with the Affordable Care Act, extremely low community use of the hospital and a lack of consistent physician coverage.(snip) Wellmont says the closure is to major cuts in Medicare reimbursements by the federal government associated with the Affordable Care Act and a lack of Medicaid expansion by the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Starting Jan. 1, Bert Fish Medical Center will no longer hire tobacco users, joining two other local hospitals in telling smokers not to apply. Applicants will be tested for a nicotine byproduct and sign an agreement to remain tobacco-free during their employment with the New Smyrna Beach public hospital. The prohibition doesn't apply to volunteers, medical staff or Bert Fish's roughly 700 employees who were hired before the implementation date... "Not all slopes are slippery but this one really is," said Lewis Maltby, president on the National Workrights Institute, a nonprofit offshoot of the American Civil Liberties Union based in...

DALLAS (CBS 11 NEWS) – Police were called to Baylor University Medical Center’s emergency room, after a dead fetus was found in one of the public restrooms. The discovery was made about 9 a.m. on Wednesday. Dallas Police Child Abuse detectives say they think they have identified the mother and are only describing her as a juvenile. Investigators will only say the fetus was deceased, and have given no details on how developed it was or if it was viable. Hospital visitors are in disbelief that a delivery could happen with potential help so close by.

A huge building which during the Crusader period was the largest hospital in the Middle East has been discovered in the heart of Jerusalem, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) announced on Monday. Located in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, the 1,000-year-old hospital was identified following a decade-long reconstruction operation. “Until a decade or so ago the building served as a bustling and crowded fruit and vegetable market. Since then it stood there desolate,” the IAA said in a statement. According to Renee Forestany and Amit Re’em, the IAA excavation directors, the structure, only a small part...

PRETORIA, South Africa -- U.S. President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama will meet on Saturday with relatives of anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela, but they will not visit the hospital where the former South African president is critically ill, the White House said. Obama is in South Africa on the second stop of a three-nation Africa tour. His visit had triggered intense speculation that the United States' first African-American president might visit 94-year-old Mandela in the Pretoria hospital where he has spent three weeks being treated for a lung infection.

ABC7 has confirmed the region’s two military hospitals are furloughing more than 3,500 civilian employees who care for the nation’s wounded warriors, nearly their entire civilian staffs. The impacted employees are from departments across the board at both hospitals, including members of the trauma team, physical therapists and nurses. They will be forced to take 11 unpaid furlough days starting in July. Hospital officials say the furloughs affect 2,392 caregivers at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda. That’s 94% of the civilian staff there. Officials say 1,163 caregivers at Fort Belvoir’s hospital in Virginia are being furloughed, affecting...

In U.S. hospitals, an estimated 1 in 20 patients pick up infections they didn't have when they arrived, some caused by dangerous 'superbugs' that are hard to treat... Machines that resemble "Star Wars" robots and emit ultraviolet light or hydrogen peroxide vapors. Germ-resistant copper bed rails, call buttons and IV poles. Antimicrobial linens, curtains and wall paint. While these products can help get a room clean, their true impact is still debatable. There is no widely-accepted evidence that these inventions have prevented infections or deaths.

Imagine having a laundry service that caters to a large health care facility. The usual delivery of dirty bed linens arrives and sits around for 48 hours. Finally, a tired worker drags the large duffel-type bag over to a workstation and starts to yank the contents of the bag out onto a table or the floor. All of a sudden, something unexpected tumbles out. It’s not hospital slipper socks, nor a damp towel. It’s not even a standard crumpled up pile of blue Chux. Wrapped in a sheet like a shroud is a fully formed stillborn baby. baby_wrapped_up_in_blanket_close-up_IAI007000423 That scenario...

65-year-old man says nurse in her 20s raped him at Philadelphia hospital The man claims the woman assaulted him on Feb. 27 while he was at Temple University Hospital recovering from a motorcycle accident. A 65-year-old man says a young female nurse raped him while he was recovering from a motorcycle accident at a Philadelphia hospital last month. The man, who has not been identified, said a Temple University Hospital nurse in her 20s entered his room at around 3:30 a.m. on Feb. 27, offered to bathe him and then sexually assaulted him in a bathroom, NBC Philadelphia reported. Police...

Brasilia, Mar 28, 2013, Reuters: A Brazilian doctor who was charged with killing seven patients to free up beds at a hospital intensive care unit may have been responsible for as many as 300 deaths, according to a Health Ministry investigator. Prosecutors said Dr Virginia Soares de Souza and her medical team administered muscle relaxing drugs to patients, then reduced their oxygen supply, causing them to die of asphyxia at the Evangelical Hospital in the southern city of Curitiba. De Souza, a 56-year-old widow, was arrested last month and charged with seven counts of aggravated first degree murder.

Probably few among the House of Israel chanted "Next Year in Jerusalem" more fervently and with more passion this Passover than members of the Biton family, who marked this year's Festival of Freedom by celebrating this year's seder in a hospital hallway. The family was denied the privilege of spending the holiday at home due to a road terror attack several days ago left the family’s youngest child, 3-year-old Adelle, in critical condition. Mother Adva and sisters Na'ama and Avigayil were wounded in the crash caused by the rocks hurled at the family's vehicle as well. The family was joined...