Posted on 07/01/2008 12:06:10 PM PDT by Smogger
NEW YORK - Video from a surveillance camera at a Brooklyn hospital shows a woman dying on the floor of a psychiatric emergency room while people nearby ignore her.
The video was released Monday by lawyers suing Kings County Hospital alleging neglect and abuse of mental health patients at the facility.
The video shows the 49-year-old woman keeling over and falling out of her chair on June 19 and lying facedown on the floor, then thrashing before going still. About an hour passed before someone realized what was happening and tried to help.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
An understatement from watching the video.
Poor woman.
This would be a good add for national health rationing.
Shades of NOLA/Katrina, where blacks waited to be rescued by the whites, and were damned pissed when they had to wait.
I don’t even know what to say.
You might be onto something there.
At least the staff knew how to react in case of a real emergency!!!
I can’t watch the video.
Kings County Hospital is a chamber of horrors. You NEVER want to end up there.
Without reading the article and without knowing anything about the place or the hospital I will make one guess: It is a Gov’t Hospital.
OK - now I will read the article to see if I wrong....
If you've ever been to an emergency room of any sort in a city, you realize a large number of people are there for the simplest excuses, such as a minor cut or a bruise, because they will get someone to eventually look at them—even if they have no money. This is why ERs must triage patients and the excessive use of ERs for colds and simple ailments is the major reason ER costs to those who pay have skyrocketed.
I would fully expect that in a “psychiatric” ER that a number of these people, many likely on drugs, alcohol, etc., fall asleep on the furniture and floors. Big deal. The floor offers more room to sleep.
I don't really see a problem with this like what is being painted in the report. Of course a lawyer will say ‘people go to ERs to live, not die’ and the ACLU will say ‘this violates “patient's rights”’ and all that bull. Where in the Constitution does it say I have a “right” to demand you give me attention when I want it? It doesn't say a thing that would make me think a doctor should do a thing for me.
I don't fault the security guy or the others for this issue much at all. However, the guy getting hit in traffic and then ignored by passersby in the snip of video attached to the report, does really bother me. There is no reason to believe an elderly man chose to sleep in the middle of a busy street.
A laughably racist comment that also happens to be patently false.
The first security guard, doctor, and nurse were all pretty clearly white. As if that makes any difference.
Very disturbing to say the least.
Do these employees not know that they are being taped? At any rate, every employee who ignored her should not just be fired, they should be charged with (I’m not sure what but don’t they have an obligation as professionals to do something?)
Just disgusting.
The amazing thing to me is that the ER didn’t look busy at all.
susie
>>The New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation, which runs the hospital, said six people have been fired as a result of the incident, including security personnel and members of the medical staff.<<
Until HHC’s president, Alan Aviles is fired I wouldn’t expect any changes.
They didn't sit on their asses like the people in the lounge.
They obviously notified medical personnel.
Why couldn't the tubs-of-lard sitting in the lounge have gone for help?
The staff seemed uncomfortable with her on the floor but acted like they didn't want to confront the issue. The nurse could have bent down to check her but she didn't kick her. Looks bad though.
So sad. So terribly sad. Shame on those people who noticed her lying there and did nothing. Cold, calloused people.
True story: a doctor friend of mine did her residency in emergency medicine at Kings County Hospital about 10 years ago. At some point she realized she was being stalked by a relative of a patient she had seen very briefly before the patient was admitted to the hospital where s/her subsequently died, and reported this to both hospital officials and police. A while later, she arrived home in the wee hours of a morning, and the guy was lying in wait for her and stabbed her. She survived and went back to work very quickly. Police knew the perp’s identity but never caught him — they advised her to move to a high security building (yeah right, in NYC, on a resident’s salary!). She asked the hospital to at least provide her with a security guard to escort her to her car when she was leaving the hospital after dark, but the hospital simply refused.
Young doctors are apparently expendable in this hospital’s view, and given the unconstitutional residency system, it’s not like she had the option to quit and go work somewhere else. But if some deadbeat drug addict passes out and dies on the ER floor while waiting for free “medical” care, it seems the hospital management gets all high and mighty and starts firing people. Our tax dollars at work . . .
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