Posted on 05/03/2007 3:58:20 PM PDT by wagglebee
Are you quite sure of this? IIRC, we had a report months ago that Mrs. Vo had died. I do not have a link. The daughter's name is Loann Trinh, I believe.
Venlang Vo, but she was also referred to as Yolang Vo. Don't ask :-) I haven't the faintest idea why the different names. She had a husband, Mr. Tran or something close to that. We did not hear much about him except that he was devoted to her and took care of her with infinite love and patience.
Andrea Clarke's sister visited the Vo family and wrote about it. I think it was posted on the Terri Schiavo site. That's as far as my memory stretches. Hope it gives you some leads.
Thank you T’wit. One of my favorite things about Free Republic is the vast knowledge and expertise of some of the members here, like you.
Hocndoc, you’re right that neither of these women were denied dialysis. Nobody claimed they were. The fact is, they were both threatened with denial of dialysis, and their families had to hire a lawyer (Jerri Lynn Ward) to fight for their right to continue receiving dialysis, in accordance with the stated wishes of both women.
Andrea Clarke’s family did not allow her ventilator to be turned off. Yet you claim to have knowledge that they did. Where are you getting that information? You speak with the authority of one who has inside information, but you’re giving out false information.
I’d like to know where you got the idea that kidney failure is relatively painless. Would you really subject your patients to that? You can’t be serious.
I am continuously amazed at the depth of expertise thousands of Freepers, pulling together, can offer. I don't believe I've ever seen a subject that Freepers can't address with specialized, Ph.D.-level knowledge. The Terri Schiavo case involves a lot of medicine, so it is specially satisfying and useful that we have doctors aboard. Polybius (a radiologist) blew a fatal hole in one of the mainstays of "right to die" propaganda, namely, that CT scan of Terri's brain vs. that of a healthy young woman. The propagandists used non-comparable slices to make Terri's look bad. As you and I have seen, every little armchair radiologist, with no medical training whatever, was able to read those brain scans and tell us how hopeless Terri was. (Wikipedia still shows the scans, or did the last time I looked.) Not one picked up that they were being conned.
Tagline practice :-)
Thanks T’wit. I missed that news. I pray for peace for her family.
You’re most welcome. I’ve added my prayer for the family.
BykrBayb,
Your comment # 27 implied that patients had been denied dialysis, and I asked about it. That’s the problem with these long conversations, over time: it’s easy to forget what we were talking about.
It’s obvious that Andrea Clark’s ventilator was turned off, since she was declared dead. There was no attempt to support her circulation (pacer, surgery for the heart), the ventilator and monitors were purposefully turned off.
However, since you asked: I have been in meetings with the team taking care of Mrs. Clarke at least once a month, sometimes more often, as we worked on the language for the amendments to improve the Texas Advance Directive Act.
The family let Mrs. Clarke die when she had a heart attack a few days after the gall bladder aspiration proved to be futile, after her blood pressure failed and she appeared to be septic - or to have an overwhelming infection. They decided to allow her heart to stop.
A trial of dialysis, ventilators, pacers, blood pressure support, and feeding is the right thing to do in most of the cases we’ve heard so much about. They are also guaranteeing that the patient’s last days will be spent in the hospital ICU where they are separated from their families and familiar surroundings, where visitors are restricted in number and times of visits. They will be surrounded and invaded with monitors, subjected to labs, suctioning, IV replacements, and the complete loss of any hope of modesty.
The problem with Mrs. Vo and with Emilio Gonzales is that no one can order a surgeon to sign on to a case and perform as directed. Mrs. Vo needed a shunt placement for dialysis and Emilio’s lawyers are demanding a tracheostomy and feeding tube placement. None of their doctors perform these procedures. Who are you going to impress into service?
I’m a family doc. I’ve sat with patients and families, I’ve been called to the ER and the nursing home for patients who present in acute renal failure and taken care of a couple of patients who died after they refused dialysis. (One poor woman’s bones had become so brittle from bedrest and years of dialysis that her legs broke when we transferred her to the gurney to go to dialysis.)
The most striking symptom in elderly or debilitated patients is the effect of renal failure on the brain. They get sleepy and their mental status goes down fast. They look like they’ve had a stroke. It’s much better than a heart attack or an actual stroke, because the patient is in no pain, usually unaware, and they stop being hungry or thirsty. Sometimes there’s fluid backup or respiratory problems, but not usually, since the symptoms progress so fast.
On the other hand, adjusting IV and tube feedings, restricting fluids, dealing with the anemia, itching and blood pressure ups and downs - usually it bottoms out - that accompany dialysis in patients with heart or vascular disease, are a continual manipulation of the patient as well as meds and labs. I hate writing fluid restrictions for anyone — much less in dying patients.
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