Grandfather 'killed by blister on his toe from new shoes'

DailyMail ^ | 8/8/07 | Unknown

[Blood of Tyrants]

A grandfather died after a blister caused by tight new shoes led to blood poisoning and massive organ failure. Peter Catterall, 60, was given dressings by a district nurse and told the sore on his toe should heal by itself.

But just over a week later, the retired electrician suffered two heart attacks.

[snip]

But according to his youngest daughter, Sara, 21, the sore continued to weep, and when she went to see him a week later on July 1 he confessed: "This toe is killing me."

Miss Catterall said yesterday: "I am no nurse, but I immediately knew he had septicaemia because my mum had had it before.

"There was a hole in his foot. I told him he had to go to the doctor but he said: 'They have discharged me'."

[Osage Orange]

If that's what you meant.....I totally missed it.

No blood, no foul.

FWIW-

[oneamericanvoice]

Good deal. Glad you got it. Sorry I didn’t communicate better.

[sig226]

Discharge only means that the care ended. It does not imply a hospital stay. If you break your arm, they put a cast on it and then discharge you and send you home. The word discharge does not mean that he stayed there overnight in this case.

[boop]

“Someone talked about socialized medicine...my father may not have died if the VA had taken their time to do a culture on my fathers swollen face.” <p.
I am so sorry for your loss. What a horrible situation. Actually VA medicine is very similar to what a socialized medicine system works like.

[VOA]

The joys of socialized medicine and the 'Rats want to bring it to you.

I agree because about half of our American MDs I've had treat my
recurrent cellulitis (bacterial skin infection) have been
FREAKIN' MORONS when diagnosing a simple case of cellulitis.

My fear is that under socialized medicine, that 50% incompetency
rating might rise to something like 90%.

Topic article of this thread is a good case in point.

[VOA]

It’s surprising what a small break in the skin can lead to sometimes.

As I once heard on some "Nature" show...
"When something that can be eaten appears....
a predator will appear that will eat it."

[VOA]

He should have gone back when the toe continued to hurt and/or when
his daughter told him she believed it was infected.

Sadly, I suspect that in the UK/Socialized Medicine regime,
it's hard to tell your current doctor "YOU'RE FIRED!!!" and
get another one before you die.

My favorite example of this was an episode of "Missed Diagnosis"
that appeared on Discovery Channel.
A mother kept taking her feverish, lethargic son back to their
family physician for over a week, each time being told "he'll
get better".

Eventually the fever got so high, the parents took the boy to
the local hospital via the emergency room.
The family physician showed up and tried again to say "take
him home, he'll be OK"...
when the mother screamed to him "YOU'RE FIRED".

Fortunately, the mother stumbled on an attending nurse that gave
her the name of a doc that came in like the cavalry and diagnosed
Kawasaki's disease.
And got antibiotics started immediately as the kid had symptoms
for 10 days...just about the time at which irreversible damage
starts to set in.

The boy made a full recovery.

He might not have been even this lucky in a socialized healthcare system.

[hocndoc]

The lesson from that show wasn’t that the diagnosis was missed - it’s to keep going back if you’re worried, because some things can’t be diagnosed early in the course of the disease.

Kawasaki disease is a syndrome that’s hard to diagnose, and by definition it can’t be diagnosed in less than 5 days and antibiotics don’t help. We use immunoglobulins and high dose aspirin.

http://www.emedicine.com/EMERG/topic811.htm
http://www.aafp.org/afp/990600ap/3093.html

The lesson from that show wasn’t that the diagnosis was missed - it’s to keep going back if you’re worried, because some things can’t be diagnosed early in the course of the disease.

[RVN Airplane Driver]

Charming. Perhaps you’ve never seen a small medical condition become serious, regardless you’d do well to think a bit before you mouth off.

Well Miss Medical know it all...Excuse me....for stating the obvious!

[Blood of Tyrants]

There are plenty of VA hospital horror stories to go around. Don’t even start my wife on how they treated her dad, a WWII vet with diabetes and foot ulcers.

[VOA]

The lesson from that show wasn’t that the diagnosis was missed - it’s
to keep going back if you’re worried, because some things can’t
be diagnosed early in the course of the disease.

That is one lesson.

Additionally, it's good that we still have a system in which
second opinions are still within reach.

As in when a doctor still misses a diagnosis.
Even on the tenth day of symptoms.

As was related in the case in point.

(and yes, Kawasaki's does sound like a diagnosis challenge)

[oneamericanvoice]

Discharge means that you were admitted to the hospital for a certain length of time, whether it is a few hours, overnight, or days. The scenario that you gave of receiving a cast would not entail admission.