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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Nov 2012
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    Default Patient Given an Overdose While in a Hospital

    My question involves medical malpractice in the state of: NJ
    How can a Hospital/Nurse not be held accountable for giving a patient an overdose of medication? The patient received the ENTIRE bag in minutes instead of a drip over hours! The drug was Argatroban a blood thinner(rat poison). I am being told that since the patient entered the hospital sick(I thought we all went to the hospital sick?) that it would be hard to prove it was the overdose that killed him! If the patient was that sick, wouldn't it give the hospital/care takers more of a responsibility NOT to do something like this? It seems to me that if you present yourself to a hospital with any condition, they can do whatever they want to you and blame it on the condition?? Just doesn't seem right or fair?

  2. #2
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    Sep 2011
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    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    Medicine is called a practice, because many times it is not definitive. Argatrobin is an anti clotting agent. It appears the individual you reference had a condition which manifested results that paralleled side effects of this medication. As the processes of the body are not consistent, it appears there is not a way to distinguish damage present, with what may have been exacerbated by this situation. I suggest for your own piece of mind, you run this by a med-mal attorney. I'm sorry for your loss.

  3. #3
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    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    You should second guess that. People in the medical field are no less human than you are, in spite of them having received training to appear so. I am always proactive in second guessing medical providers, researching things to make sure they are following a logical course of action and questioning and correcting their actions, while they perform their duties. It is a proven fact patients with involved relatives receive better care than those without relatives that are actively involved with their hospital stay.

    Case in point, a Dr forgot his laptop in my MIL's room after a visit, where he clearly conveyed he had inspected all test/lab results. I advised the nurses station to call him so he would not be running around the hospital looking for it. When he reappeared 15 minutes later, he walked in, smiled and stated how he had just gone to checkup on her lab work and that everything was looking good. I politely turned to him and said "I was the one who told the nurses station to call you because you forgot your laptop. I didn't want you to be walking around the hospital looking for it." He passed over the statement and said he would be going now, picked up his laptop and left.

  4. #4
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    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    You're who in this situation?

  5. #5
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    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    Quote Quoting Dogmatique
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    You're who in this situation?
    Well, obviously not the patient...

    Agree though, it would help us to know the OP's role in this situation. Also OP, what's this "rat poison" reference?

  6. #6
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    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    Quote Quoting eerelations
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    Well, obviously not the patient...

    Agree though, it would help us to know the OP's role in this situation. Also OP, what's this "rat poison" reference?
    Rat poisons are anti clotting agents that cause the rats to hemorrhage to death.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Nov 2012
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    6

    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    Hi....I am the spouse of the late patient. Also was told an ingredient of blood thinners is rat poison? Not sure if this is true but regardless an overdose of anything can't be good!

  8. #8
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    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    Take your late spouse's medical records to a local med-mal attorney who can guide you further.

    Forget "rat poison".

    Really.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Sep 2005
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    Default Re: Can Someone Please Help Me Understand

    As Dogmatique suggests, if you want a meaningful analysis you need to have the medical records reviewed by a malpractice firm - but it sounds like you've done that. If you want to share more information here, somebody may be able to provide greater insight, but without a time line and information about the reason for hospitalization and cause of death we have nothing to work with.

    Argatroban is a blood thinner with a short half-life. The reasonable inference from the small amount of information you have shared is that the lawyers you've consulted so far, and the doctors and nurses they work with in analyzing medical malpractice cases, have not been able to find a causal connection between the overdose and your husband's unfortunate death.

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