Posted on 11/04/2005 3:24:09 AM PST by 8mmMauser
Family members are investigating what they consider to be suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of a nursing home patient at the center of a life and death tug-of-war reminiscent of the Terri Schiavo tragedy.
Seventy-nine-year-old Jimmy Chambers died in the early morning hours of Oct. 24 after the tracheotomy tubes that deliver oxygen from a ventilator to a hole in his neck became unhooked. Family members were told Chambers, a resident of the Anne Maria Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in North Augusta, S.C., apparently pulled the interlocking tubes apart.
"We're having it investigated. We're just incredulous," Chambers' daughter, Deanna Potter, told WND in reference to her siblings. "The last time I saw dad he was blowing me a kiss. I blew him one and he blew one back."
The retired dispatcher for Holland Motor Express died approximately 10 hours later. His death certificate indicates he died of "natural causes."
"Apparently, suffocation is a 'natural cause' when you're on a ventilator. We're contesting that," said Potter. "He suffocated. He didn't just pass away. He struggled and fought. And I'm just so angry."
Potter estimates it would have taken 10 to 14 minutes for her father, deprived of oxygen, to fall unconscious, and questions why the nursing home staff didn't come to his aid.
"The oxygen-saturation meter and his ventilator both would have had alarms going off. Four-thirty, five o'clock in the morning you'd think someone would hear this," she added. "That's the thing that really bothers me and makes me suspicious."
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
Nope, it is the Clearwater Courthouse and they don't even have 8mm Mausers (Looks like.)
And when you do go to a hospital, because there is a chance that you can live, go to a pro-life hospital.
There are those among us who believe that the elderly and any handicapped person doesn't have the quality of life that they ascribe to and that they should die. This is sad and scary but very true. Guard your family as best you can when you are in a hospital or care center.
Thank you 8mm for posting the guest book link!! To all, it does not surprise me for a moment that the ACLU wants to remove the 23rd Psalm from a public place. They are as afraid of God's word as the devil was when he tempted Christ in the wilderness. The MUST get it out of their sight....
From an email (a call to arms, really) from June Maxam:
"I will do all that I can to educate people about what Eden Park and Lloyd Cote did to my father and my family in concert with Glens Falls Hospital and Warren County Department of Social services and the other Warren County powers that be. I hope others who oppose the changing of health care proxies against the wishes of the patient and those who oppose the euthanasia, throwaway society will join me in my education and awareness campaign."
We are speaking out, but we can join together on this campaign and be even more affective... 2 can put 10,000 to flight. Please respond to June's call. Thank you!!!
I just saw this article on another site I read.
http://www.northcountrygazette.org/articles/111105NoDignity.html
It just breaks my heart to read more of this stuff being allowed to go on in our country! We have to stop it!
I hope the memory of Terri's murder haunts him and his brother for life.
To: Everyone
Good morning everyone. I just wanted to ask for your prayers today. It is my Dad's 80th birthday. I know we can depend on your prayers and it gives me great strength. Thank you all so much. I know that Dad's celebration of life today is in the presence of the Giver of Life. It must be incredible.
Prayers for your Father and for you and those who have acted with such courage. May Our Lord award you with abundant Grace to persevere.
8mm
"The standard living-will documents that are advocated by those who support euthanasia have a general presumption for death," Sturm told Zenit news service. "The language is often ambiguous and can be interpreted by a health-care provider in a variety of ways that a patient did not intend."
"Some living wills allow for the withdrawal of nutrition and hydration -- which, of course, includes food and water -- if a patient is comatose or vegetative," she told Zenit. "It is against Catholic teaching to refuse a patient nutrition and hydration just because they have these diagnoses."
"In other words, a living will can kill a person," she explained.
Pro-Life Nurse Says Living Wills Present Euthanasia Problems for Pro-Lifers
8mm
RN Ford Comments:
Terri Schiavo guardian shares his experience at lecture
Guest Speaker: Jay Wolfson, Dr. P.H., J.D. spoke about his now former client, Theresa Schiavo.
"I would sit with her and stroke her hair and hold her hand and I would take her head in my hands and beg her to help me help her," said Jay Wolfson, Dr. P.H., J.D. about his now former client, Theresa Schiavo.
As he talked about his personal thoughts and experiences of brain-damaged Schiavo\'s case Nov. 10, the FIU community sat, and stood, in Graham Center 140, silently listening to Wolfson\'s every word.
Although the fight for Schiavo\'s future had been going on for years, Wolfson, professor of public health and medicine at the University of South Florida, came into the picture in 2003 as the court appointed Special Guardian ad Litem.
He was the legal representative for Schiavo. He had a month to look through all of the legal and medical documents "of a woman I didn\'t know." He reported to Governor Jeb Bush and the courts as to whether or not Schiavo should have more swallowing tests administered. This would guide the governor in his decision-making about the case.
"I didn\'t follow the O.J. or the Schiavo case," said Wolfson. "All of a sudden, I am asked to inject myself into this thing."
Wolfson did more than just read 30,000 pages worth of documents. He turned to famous philosophers and writers such as Dante, Descartes and Nietzsche for answers. He spent time with Schiavo\'s family, the Schindlers and with Michael Schiavo, her husband. Wolfson also spent one to four hours a day with Schiavo.
"I was seeking both information and knowledge," he said.
Wolfson had many special tasks as Schiavo\'s Guardian ad Litem. One of them was to serve in the best interests of his ward. Wolfson said that the problem he had with that task was whether or not he should do what he, or someone else thought was best for Schiavo.
Another task Wolfson had was to determine if there was "feasibility and value in swallowing tests and swallowing therapy given the totality of the circumstances." Wolfson\'s problem with this was that value can be relative.
Wolfson had to make a decision concerning Schiavo\'s fate.
"The scientist in me had to come in," Wolfson said.
The rules given to Wolfson for his decision-making were clear. He had to give competent, clear and convincing evidence.' '"We can take the best law we can and apply it in the best way we can. That is all we can do," Wolfson said.
Wolfson explained that when Schiavo had her accident, she fell and her brain was without oxygen for 12 minutes. She had slipped into a coma and was put on a respirator for a month. Two months later, she was considered vegetative. Schiavo could not swallow liquids.
Wolfson showed on a projector a picture of Schiavo\'s cerebral cortex. He explained that this was where reasoning is. It was where the consciousness may be and it was beyond reflexes. Schiavo\'s cerebral cortex was found to be all liquid.
"Her cerebral cortex was gone," Wolfson said.
Finally, Wolfson\'s decision was made. He decided that additional testing could and would be done if everyone agreed in advance as to how the results were to be used. An agreement was never made.
From within the whirlwind, Wolfson discovered two things.
"I wound up learning that there was something about this case, and it involved a certain chemical - hope," Wolfson said. "Is hope maybe the ability of human beings to have something beyond yourself that is a part of you?"
Wolfson called this ability the divine spark.
"It\'s that special thing which makes us human," Wolfson said.
The second thing Wolfson discovered involved perspective.
"Much of what we see and hear is just the tip of the iceberg, and everyone will have different perspectives of the tip," he said. "What I do know is that things that are said and are represented are not the same."
As the lecture came to an end, Wolfson said he could see why life is so important to people. "The alternative is the unknown and could be not being," he said.
good alternatives. National Right to Life, the International Anti-Euthanasia Task Force
Good Morning, good info and thanks! 8mmMauser
Dr. P.H., J.D.
All the letters after his name and he's still a heartless idiot. A 12-year old knows more about life than him.
Focus on the Family -- today's broadcast is on
"a different kind of care" -- ie, hospice care.
with Margaret Cotter, MD, palliative care physician
88.1 here in Jax.
It's always personal. It helps to know you've done everything you could, but it still hurts like hell.
It is a source book, chock full of documents, evidence, and will take some time to wade through. It will be a valuable reference to those of us who would love to see justice wrought on the perps.
The book, Our Fight4Terri
Discounted for Fight4Terri supporters at: www.Fight4Terri.com
or, can be ordered directly from publisher at:
Trafford Publishing: Our Fight4Terri
Thank you for understranding..
Bring me up to date on hospice. My impression was that you had to be within days or weeks of certain death to be in hospice care. All that I've read on this thread seems to indicate that hospice can be good or bad. The fact that a non terminal patient like Terri Schiavo was in hospice has always puzzled me. Can you help me out with the differences and what to look for?
Hi, DadsGirl -- good to see you here! You and your family have been in my (our) thoughts and prayers.
http://www.fight4terri.com/
has links to other helpful, informative websites, including:
http://www.hospicepatients.org/ -- hospice "consumer advocate"
Margaret Cottle, MD (I mentioned her above) statement:
http://www.physiciansforlife.ca/pallcarecomments.html
It has always perplexed me, too. In a true terminal illness, the patient is expected to die within (say) 6 months. In Terri's case (and we saw the documents), she was falsely listed as having a terminal illness. It is due to a willful blurring and misrepresentation of terminal illness with long term incapacitation or disability, to whatever extent.
good hospice/bad -- does it meet your needs? are they willing to work with you/the family through any difficulties or misunderstandings that might reasonably come up? the needs of the dying individual and loved ones must all be considered.
Dr. Cottle on Focus on the Family radio made the point that the person will die as he has lived, full of the love and support of loved ones.
gtg now. Take care, and may you be blessed with what you need the most right now.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.