Can you say a good word for this couragous nurse?
.
Posted on 09/05/2006 4:45:45 AM PDT by 8mmMauser
Boston, MA (LifeNews.com) -- Haleigh Poutre was the victim of child abuse and was nearly killed via euthanasia when Massachusetts officials gave up on her after she entered a coma. Now Poutre, once termed "brain dead" by doctors, continues to improve and is speaking a few words, her grandmother says.
Sandra Sudyka, the girl's biological grandmother, is no longer allowed to visit her granddaughter and now says she is ready to speak to the media about Poutre's condition.
She told The Republican newspaper that she last saw Poutre on July 18 but indicated she was "doing well."
"She was bright-eyed and smiling. She is always responsive to us," Sudyka explained.
Department of Social Services had asked Sudyka not to talk with reporters about Haleigh, but since they will no longer allow her and Haleigh's biological mother, Allison Avrett, to visit the 12 year-old, she said she's going to talk to the media.
"I decided since they broke the deal, I am going to talk. People should know how well she is doing," Sudyka told the newspaper.
"They don't want people to know how she is doing after they wanted to pull the plug," Sudyka said.
DSS spokeswoman Denise Monteiro declined an interview with The Republican but said that the visiting privileges have been suspended, not terminated.
Haleigh first began speaking in June, her grandmother told the newspaper.
"I was saying to her 'I love you,' and she was trying to say 'love' and it came out as a vibration...'ove,'" Sudyka said.
Sudyka, who is working with an attorney to adopt the girl, said she has said hello, responds to comments and questions, speaks nonverbally and is able to write her name. Haleigh can't walk and is confined to a wheelchair.
Avrett, Poutre's biological mother, lost custody of her daughter after physically abusing her. Poutre was put into a foster home where her adoptive parents also abused her. Her adopted mother committed suicide after abusing Poutre so much she had to be hospitalized.
DSS took Poutre into custody and when she appeared to slip into a coma, the agency asked the state Supreme Court for permission to take her life. That's when Poutre began responding.
Poutre has been receiving physical, speech and occupational therapy since January 26 at Franciscan Hospital for Children in Brighton.
Gov. Mitt Romney appointed a commission to look into how the state failed to properly handle the girl's case.
Is 15 years long enough to prove you wrong? As in Terri Schiavo's case.
Terri Schiavo was in a vegetative state, not brain dead.
But your side said she was brain dead. Are you changing your definitions again?
? Who is "my side"?
Look, everyone knows that there are evil people in any profession...and that includes medicine...but unfortunately, its gotten so bad around here, that all the doctors are being broadly painted as being some sort of ogres, never ever want to help people but only wanting to do harm...and that broad brush way of painting the medical profession is wrong, no matter how you look at it..
Anyone and everyone can point to a situation where such and such a doctors opinion was not followed...big deal...thats what second, third and fourth opinions are for...people are not stupid, they look for other opinions, and they do it all the time...but if I believe some of the crap I have heard around here, it would be quite impossible to ever find an honest doctor...and as far as I am concerned that is nothing but pure spiteful, rumor mongering...
Check out the doctors, thats what we do...my husband questions each and every doctor we have ever had...he wants to know where they went to college, what medical school they went to, what kind of grades they got, where did they practice previously, and on and on...and guess what?...not one doctor we have ever had, has refused to answer these questions, and always, always, welcome second and third and fourth opinions, if we request to have them...
And I would be willing to bet, that any other rational human being, could and does do the same thing...there are rotten docs sure...just like there are rotten lawyers, rotten teachers, rotten nurses, rotten truck drivers, rotten judges, rotten journalists, rotten, name your chosen profession....bad people infest any and all professions...
But to label a whole profession as 'evil' because of the few evils ones within it, is sheer lunacy...and I dont say that lightly...it is lunacy...
You're confusing to talk to. Are you going to answer who "my side" is? All of these sudden zig-zags of topic are quite disorienting.
My understanding of brain death, is that the brain no longer functions in any way at all....which means, that the patient must be hooked up to a ventilator, which makes them breathe, being that the brain is no longer able to allow respiration to take place naturally...
Sometimes people are placed on ventilators for a temporary amt of time, after major surgery to allow ease of breathing, but once they recover from surgery are taken off the ventilators...
Brain dead people, to my understanding anyway, do not begin to breathe once removed from the ventilator...
In fact, that was one of the tests done on my own son...he was removed from the ventilator, to see if any spontaneous respiration would take place....which in my sons case, it did not take place...and so he was placed back on the ventilator, and a number of other tests were conducted to assure that he was indeed, dead...
Yes, I'm sorry you had to go through that. Apparently no one who has been declared brain dead has ever recovered even with life support.
"..But to label a whole profession as 'evil' because of the few evils ones within it, is sheer lunacy..."
Who is saying the whole profession is evil?
But in Halleigh's case, and this thread IS about Halleigh, the doctors were unscrupulous and/or incompetent.
I would expect that in your son's case, he was examined and found to be hopeless by people who wanted him to recover. The worry of many people on this thread, and it seems to be quite warranted, is that some people are being declared hopeless by "doctors" who want them to be.
There are a lot of comatose or vegetative people alive today who may or may not ever get better. Such people would represent a very lucrative supply of organs if they could be slaughtered for harvest. Some people who call themselves doctors are all too willing to decide that a patient's organs would be put to better use in someone who would likely recover after a transplant, than remaining in their owner who may or may not ever recover; they don't care if their actions reduce their patient's chance of recovery from 10% to 0%--other matters are more important.
Another thing to consider: scientists continue to discover new ways of healing or curing patients from what had earlier been thought to be hopeless conditions. Consequently, it seems somewhat disingenuous to categorize a patient in stable condition as "hopeless". Even if there's no technology on the horizon to cure the patient, that doesn't mean such technology may not be developed in the patient's lifetime (if the patient is allowed to live that long).
Obviously, if a patient's condition isn't stable, such principles may not apply. If someone is suffering from terminal cancer and is only a few weeks from death, it's very unlikely that any cure would be developed and usable within that timeframe and so the patient's condition might be regarded as hopelessly incurable. On the other hand, a person who is comatose or vegetative but is otherwise stable may well be curable even if the technologies required for such cure haven't been invented yet.
Having had to watch and wait as all of these tests were done on my son, to determine if he was brain dead or not, I know, that at least in my case, the docs hoped against hope, that he was not brain dead, and were doing everything possible to give me some glimmer of hope..it just was not to be...and to leave him on life support, when he was clearly brain dead, was quite frankly, ghoulish in nature..
thank you for your kind thoughts...
Do give me a break...from the very beginning of the Terri Shiavo case, some people, tho thankfully very few,on FR, were clearly denigrating all doctors...
If you have nothing to hide, answer the question on Nurse Iyer. Trolls get rather old you know on pro-life threads.
Phooey. You've asked if the people on "my side" think something, yet you refuse to answer who "my side" is supposed to be. I think it's pretty clear who's trolling here.
I'm very sorry for the loss of your son.
God bless!
You make some good rational points..and that is what I am asking for...rationality....to run around and tell seniors, 'Run for your lives, the docs are out to get you', is ludicrous on its face, and flies in the face of reality...and yet, I have seen this very sentiment bandied about..I have seen sentiments posted on FR, telling people to keep their senior parents out of Florida, because going down to Florida will mean their ultimate demise at the hands of evil doctors...what kind of rationality is that?
Thank you for your condolences...
Defend Nurse Iyer, and I will show you who your side is.
A certain adage comes to mind:
Good doctors need to make clear that some things are just not acceptable, and any person who does such things should be shunned by the medical community. A doctor's first and foremost job, and his oath, is to ensure the good of his patient, not the good of some other person who needs a liver transplant. Any medical practitioner who is unwilling to put his patients' interests first is in violation of the Hippocratic Oath; those who take their oaths seriously should refuse to offer any medical teaching to such people.
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.
