Free Republic

About a year ago at Erlanger Baroness, the largest hospital in Chattanooga, anesthesia staff noticed that a nurse was slurring his words and struggling to stay awake while on duty in the surgery center, according to a Tennessee Board of Nursing consent order. In the days that followed, the nurse failed a drug test and was fired, the order states. The nurse later admitted that for months he had pilfered and abused fentanyl left over after surgeries, sometimes daily, according to the order. Under most circumstances, this would be a routine case of what is known as "drug diversion," the...

Pregnant and scared, Natasha Valle went to a Tennova Healthcare hospital in Clarksville, Tennessee, in January 2021 because she was bleeding. She didn’t know much about miscarriage, but this seemed like one. In the emergency room, she was examined then sent home, she said. She went back when her cramping became excruciating. Then home again. It ultimately took three trips to the ER on three consecutive days, generating three separate bills, before she saw a doctor who looked at her bloodwork and confirmed her fears. “At the time I wasn’t thinking, ‘Oh, I need to see a doctor,'” Valle recalled....