Doctors Dehydrated My Husband To Death: U.K. Widow

LifeSiteNews ^ | 8/8/06 | John Jalsevac

[wagglebee]

 

NORFOLK, U.K., August 8, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – At the same time that the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital is being investigated for allegedly starving and dehydrating a woman to death in 2003, the wife of a former patient treated on the same ward is calling for another investigation into the suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of her husband.

Kate Speed claims that although her husband’s death certificate states that he died from pneumonia, that in fact he died because of a hospital-ordered dehydration, an ultimately fatal measure that neither she nor her husband approved.

“The whole of my husband’s stay in hospital was a nightmare,” Kate Speed said, according to the Times Online. “They put bronchopneumonia on the death certificate, but I believe his death was from the effects of dehydration.”

The hospital’s Kimberly ward is already under investigation by Norwich coroner William Armstrong after the death a Mrs. Olive Nockels who died at the hospital in 2003 and whose family alleges that she was dehydrated to death. According to the Times Online, physician David Maisley testified last month at the inquest into Mrs. Nockel’s death that he witnessed people die of dehydration at the hospital “all the time—two or three times a week.”

Olive Nockel’s grandson, Chris West, testified at the inquest that, “I said I wouldn’t treat my dog like that and [Dr Maisey] said it was easier for vets because they had alternative means and can ‘put animals to sleep’.”

Harold Speed, a grandfather of four and former music teacher, was admitted to the hospital in October of 2004 after suffering a heart attack. Shortly thereafter a “nil by mouth” order was instituted. This order was lifted once, after complaints by Mrs. Speed, only to be reversed once again at a later date.

Speed’s wife relates: “I saw my husband deteriorate and I have no understanding of how this was allowed to happen. I questioned hospital staff but they told me an intravenous drip would have been too painful,” she said.

“I saw my husband the day before he died. He had not been physically examined that day; his records showed he was last seen 24 hours before he died.

“My husband had been in the hospital many times before and I have nothing but praise for staff there, but the ethos in Kimberly ward is terrible and I do not believe he died of natural causes.” 

Mrs. Speed says that leading up to his death Harold Speed demonstrated all the classic signs of dehydration. "His eyes were dry, sore, flat and sunken. I tried to moisten his mouth...The doctor said he was very dry and picked up the flesh from his neck. It was like picking up a sheet. His veins were flat and there was an absence of mucous.”

“We trusted, and he trusted,” says Mrs. Speed, “that the hospital would treat him well, instead of which there was a catalogue of error and apathy that led to his death, unless of course, there had been a decision, which I had no share in, that his life should no longer be preserved.”

So far hospital officials and physicians have denied that Speed died on account of dehydration. Dr Iain Brooksby, medical director, Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital denied Kate Speed’s accusations saying, “Clinical examination at the time and the objective evidence of blood tests demonstrated that the late Mr Speed was definitely not dehydrated at the time of his death in November 2004,” according to the Norwich Evening News 24. 

“He was satisfactorily hydrated and was receiving fluids and antibiotics for a chest infection when he died. We have explained to Mrs Speed that there was no evidence that dehydration contributed to his death and he died of bronchopneumonia and vascular disease."

Mrs. Speed, however, has been offered fiscal compensation for her husband’s death, compensation which she declined fearing that if she accepted the money the hospital would use it as leverage to brush the issue aside. “They asked me for a figure but I was afraid it was tactical and that they would then not have to answer questions. Just pay, and I would never know the truth of what happened,” she said.

Cases similar to Harold Speed’s are cropping up with increasing frequency. Last week LifeSiteNews.com reported on the case of the father of Wall Street journalist Pamela Winnick. Winnick related that doctors continually pestered her and her family into quietly “letting” her father go. Her father recovered shortly thereafter.

Along the same lines, in June of this year a prominent British bioethicist was quoted as saying that it is time to “regulate” the already existing practice of “involuntary euthanasia”. Pro-life advocates have pointed out from the beginning that the term “involuntary euthanasia” is simply a medical euphemism for murder.

See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Doctors Kept Asking To "Let" My Father Die: Wall Street Journalist
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/jul/06072607.html

Non-Voluntary Euthanasia – Next Logical Step for Britain says Prominent Ethicist
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/jun/06060905.html 

[MD_Willington_1976]

My great grandmother died of an infection, Dr's refused to prescribe penicillin because she was 108 years old... to old for the worlds oldest cheapest antibiotic... probably saved the tax payer $5...

[wagglebee]

You're right. I had to get a prescription for penicillin a while back, the pharmacy couldn't get my insurance card figured out and said they couldn't fill the prescription until they called the insurance company. I asked them how much it would be if I just paid for it and it was $4.50.

[MD_Willington_1976]

It's even cheaper in the "less than enlightened 3rd world countries", due process and access to medication is BS in "en-lighted 1st world countries"... pharmaceutical companies give my GP enough samples to stock his volunteer clinic in Vanuatu...

[floriduh voter]

Florida Governor Race Opinion Piece. If anyone wants the audio clip which was an attachment via email, please send me a private freepmail with your regular email address. It IS A clip of CHARLIE CRIST BETRAYING TERRI SCHIAVO, HER PARENTS AND HER BROTHER AND SISTER AND THE REST OF THE FREE WORLD.

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T VOTE FOR CHARLIE CRIST: Friends and a few who are not too friendly,

Take a moment to listen to Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist on a south Florida radio station for just over 2 minutes. This exchange is not deep, but it does illustrate Charlie's ability to say, "Yes," and "No," and "I haven't decided," in the same sentence. Charlie gives deliberately designed to confuse sound bite answers on abortion, Terri Schindler Schiavo, same sex abortion, rumors of being gay, same sex adoption, and civil unions.

This man is not fit to be governor, but the "I'm a nice family guy," lukewarm chicken soup campaign Tom Gallagher is running suggests Crist and and Gallagher have made a back room deal. Is it reasonable to speculate, after a short post election vacation, Charlie will announce Gallagher is being tapped for some spot that will keep him in the headlines.

***Forward this audio clip to every Republican primary voter in Florida, with a special emphasis on morally and spiritually well anchored Christians.

While Gallagher is ethically challenged using his government computer to trade stocks in companies he regulates, those trades have been for chump change, like friends entertaining themselves playing penny poker. Crist on the other hand used, abused his office, cooperating with an ethically and legally challenged George Greer and Bernie McCabe, to help kill an aware of self woman who screamed for her life. An official very close to McCabe conceded in a conversation with me about 2 years ago, killing a person who is aware of self is, quote, "Oh, that's FIRST DEGREE MURDER."

John Sipos

[wideminded]

Through a number of circumstances a close family friend with was temporarily placed in a state hospital ward that was caring for people with severe dementia. I went to visit him there. When I arrived he was lying in a reclining chair and seemed barely able to talk to me. This did not stand out from the condition of the other people there. But it seemed odd to me because I knew that although he had some problems he had not previously been so totally out of it. A doctor told me that his state was just due the medications he had been taking which made him drowsy. Right after this a nurse whispered in my ear that I had every right to make sure my friend was seen at a hospital. I insisted and he was seen at the emergency room. It turned out that he had been severely dehydrated and could have died if I hadn't shown up just then.

[PistolPaknMama]

It doesn't give his age.....I can't imagine the hospital not honoring the family's request to be treated.

This is socialized medicine at it's best. Billary's dream for Amerika. Sick people cost a lot of money. If they aren't going to get better to the point of being productive (i.e. paying taxes vs. using resources) then we need to quietly get them out of the way. The world is mad. Very mad.

[Malacoda]

But how could that be? We've got judges, attorneys and doctors in Florida that say starving/dehydrating is a perfectly peaceful -- nay, euphoric! -- way to go!

[ex-Texan]

I was talking to a very good friend today. He says the same thing is going on more and more today in hospices. Very common today in Oregon.

[8mmMauser]

Pinged from Terri AUGUST Dailies

8mm

[8mmMauser]

I still wonder what happened to my own Mom in Oregon, taking sick, but not that sick, and suddenly dying in their care.

[trisham]

“We trusted, and he trusted,” says Mrs. Speed, “that the hospital would treat him well, instead of which there was a catalogue of error and apathy that led to his death, unless of course, there had been a decision, which I had no share in, that his life should no longer be preserved.”

*************

This story is heartbreaking.

After personal experience with hospitals, I no longer trust those who administer "care". It's crucial for anyone who has a loved one hospitalized to be involved and questioning of treatment.

[shield]

There's a great hospices facility in the Houston Medical Center. That does not take place there. It's small town USA...surprisingly that's where so much of it takes place.

[LifeOrGoods?]

Can't trust doctors anymore.