Stop Canadian Hospital Cover-Ups

A story about the Health Care System and the great lengths they will take to intentionally cover up their negligence.

The last year my mothers' life unfolded tragically due to the negligence of our health care system, specifically the Regina General Hospital. Our nightmare unfolds...

In February 2007 Wendy McIntyre age 57 was taken into the Regina General Hospital Emergency department after falling and hurting her back at home. After examination she was sent home with no significant injuries and a prescription for morphine. My mother being a renal patient took her prescribed morphine pill at home that night. The following morning when she woke up she couldn't stand or walk on her own and she was incredibly disoriented. We called the ambulance who took her back to the hospital. The same doctor couldn't believe that this was the same woman he had seen the day before and she was admitted to the 3rd floor. She was given some sort of antidote to combat the effects of the morphine. For the next 2 weeks she remained in a state of dementia and was told that she may have suffered a stroke.

During her confused state my mother thought that her room was on fire and after buzzing for nurses who never came she climbed out of bed, fell and fractured her back in 2 spots. Should this have happened...not really. She had become extremely weak during the 4 week stay and our family expressed concerns about getting her some physiotherapy and rehab after she left the hospital. She was discharged and told that she wasn't weak enough for rehab, even though we were told to buy her a walker and think about a wheel chair for her. Keep in mind she was 57. Why wouldn't the health care system want to attempt to rehabilitate her? She went home and 4 days later and was found unconscious on the floor due to a diabetic reaction. Again the ambulance was called and she was admitted into the hospital for the next two months. After many meetings and being very persistent we managed to convince the hospital that she needed some additional care. She was granted a 4 week stay at a rehabilitation center, only catch is that as soon as you are accepted the patients 4 week time period starts. Much to our horror we were told from the hospital that there were no beds available and Mom would have to stay in the hospital until a bed became open, this never happened and she spent the entire 4 weeks in the hospital. On week 3 we were told that a bed had become open and that Mom had spiked a temperature which meant she had to give the bed up.

During her time away from the hospital Wendy continued to go three times a week for her dialysis treatments. On August 27/07 she was admitted into the hospital because her sodium levels were low and her electrolytes were not functioning properly. A few days later her condition had improved and the doctor discussed discharging her. Only because my father expressed a concern for her mobility was she kept in the hospital.

On Sept.2/07 my mother took the walker that was given to her by the hospital outside. My mother at the time was weak but was encouraged by the nurses to use the walker for exercise. The walker started to get away from her and when she went to stop it by applying the brakes they failed. As a result she fell broke her hip and suffered a serious head injury. When asked what had happened she replied "the walker started to get away from me and it didn't stop", when told about this we took the serial number and wrote it down. We assumed that because the nurses realized her extreme lack of mobility they would keep an eye on her, instead she was provided with a walker that had faulty breaks. How can a hospital give a person a piece of equipment and not know if it was working. Little did we know that after her hip surgery she was never going to be responsive again.

We feel that Wendy never did recover from the surgery and that the fall was a direct cause of her death. It also seems that because she fell on hospital property while a patient in the hospital every effort has been made by the hospital and the doctors to cover up the facts and the true cause leading to her death. We feel that if she had fallen at home and suffered head trauma and a broken hip and died a few days later the hospital and health system would be very fast to point to that as a leading contributor to her death.

Somehow the Regina General Hospital has managed to deny that the faulty walker was used (they located the walker that matched the serial number we provided them with but a nurse claims that she used a different walker the morning of her fall), they have botched the autopsy that they told us to have, they have provided three separate causes of death, they can't confirm that the anesthesiologist was aware of her head trauma and they have said that the coroner was involved in September when she died and then deny that the coroner wasn't involved until December. The hospital has manipulated the facts and lied to us from the moment she fell on their property. The very fact that the hospital was reacting to her head injury and not telling the family about her condition is cause for alarm.

Patients deserve better treatment than what my mother received. When a loved one is sick or injured and in the care of the hospital, the care that they receive should never have to suffer. Every patient has a voice but unfortunately for my mother her voice was taken away the minute she fell on hospital property. Every step from her fall on is either conflicted with another explanation provided from the hospital and then covered up. Wendy McIntyre did not get a chance to voice her concerns so her family is now doing it for her. Many arguments have been made to try and explain to us what the hospital wants us to believe. What they have forgotten is that her medical records, autopsy results, coroners role, causes of death and various other information tells a different story. We can all understand the strain that is put on our Health Care System and it's recent limitations, what we can't understand is why short cuts that cause negligence are covered up. If the almighty machine known as the Regina General Hospital is going to cover-up a patients care or lack of they should ensure that they have not ever given the family the documents to prove that a cover-up has taken place.

All the information that we have provided and the additional information that we still have is documentation provided from the hospital. I would hate to think that other families are going through the same thing as ours and have no ideal that they are entitled to ask questions and fight back.

We need to find a way to get our message to the people that are responsible for the negligence.