Report: Cover-up followed death in NYC hospital
- From: rpautrey2 <rpautrey2@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 9 Jul 2009 09:13:40 -0700 (PDT)
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iN2nQkt-hqAkWgQavGRPLGtJCWLQD98TVTR01
Report: Cover-up followed death in NYC hospital
By DAVID B. CARUSO – Jun 19, 2009
NEW YORK (AP) — Staffers at a Brooklyn hospital falsified medical
records and lied to authorities in an attempt to cover up the neglect
of a patient who died on the waiting room floor, according to city
investigators.
The report by New York's Department of Investigation was released
Friday, exactly one year after the death of Esmin Green.
Green, 49, languished in a psychiatric emergency room at the Kings
County Hospital for nearly 24 hours before collapsing from a blood
clot.
She lay on the floor for an hour, in full view of nurses, doctors and
security guards, before a nurse nudged her body with her foot, then
checked her pulse. By then she was dead.
Six hospital employees lost their jobs in the incident. The probe by
the city's main investigative agency raises the possibility that some
could also face criminal charges.
The report said that shortly after Green died, a senior nurse at the
hospital, Aida Gonzalo, made three false entries in a medical record
to make it appear as though she had been checking regularly on her
patient.
In actuality, the report said, Green had been ignored for hours — a
fact confirmed by security camera footage of her collapse and slow
death.
The Department of Investigation said the nurse subsequently admitted
in an interview that she fabricated the entries because she was afraid
of losing her job, but lied to authorities about the nature of those
inaccuracies.
Separately, a nursing aide made entries in a hospital log falsely
indicating that he had observed Green asleep during the hour when she
was actually lying face down on the floor, dying, the DOI report said.
The aide, Royal Easton, later admitted he hadn't seen Green during the
critical time period, according to the report.
"This is a case of omission and commission that ranged from doctors
who failed to examine Ms. Green to medical personnel who falsified the
hospital's records regarding her condition and treatment," DOI
Commissioner Rose Gill Hearn said in a statement.
"We hope that our factual findings will ensure that the troubling
events that surrounded Ms. Green's death are never repeated."
A lawyer for Green's family, Sanford Rubenstein, said her relatives
also hoped the report might lead to a criminal prosecution.
"Anyone identified in that report who committed a criminal act should
go to jail," he said.
A spokesman for Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes said the
office was reviewing the report but declined to comment further. No
criminal charges have been filed so far.
Gonzalo's lawyer, Daniel Ferreira, declined to comment, citing the
possibility of criminal action, but said Gonzalo was among the staff
who tried to resuscitate Green once it became apparent she was in
trouble. A former lawyer for Easton said he hadn't spoken to him since
last year but would try to contact him. An attempt to find a listed
phone number for Easton wasn't immediately successful.
The Department of Investigation report also cited factual
inconsistencies in medical records filled out by several doctors at
the hospital.
One, Dr. Dimitru Magardician, said in a hospital record that he tried
to examine Green the evening before her death but couldn't because she
was uncooperative. Security video showed no such interaction between
the doctor and patient, the report said.
Magardician's attorney, Steven Rabinowitz, declined to immediately
comment. Magardician and several other doctors refused to be
interviewed by investigators, citing their Fifth Amendment right
against self-incrimination.
The city, which owns and operates the hospital, has settled a wrongful
death lawsuit with Green's family for $2 million.
The city's Health and Hospitals Corporation has also pledged
additional millions of dollars to upgrade the facility, which, even
before Green's death, had been the subject of lawsuits and a Justice
Department investigation alleging dangerous conditions and patient
neglect.
Health and Hospitals Corp. spokeswoman Ana Marengo called the DOI
report "a necessary and final review of what went terribly wrong one
year ago."
She said the psychiatric unit had been overhauled "from top to
bottom." Among other things, the hospital has constructed a new $153
million psychiatric center and revamped its staff with 300 new
doctors, psychologists, nurses and other health care workers.
Patients now spend an average of less than nine hours in the
psychiatric emergency room, compared to more than 13 hours a year ago.
.
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