The employee of the medical College had a stroke next to one of the best hospitals in the state. But there she was not accepted she died

19 Aug 2014 37-year-old Tiffany Tate worked on hand in the dining room of the Medical College of Wisconsin in the city of Wauwatosa, when she became ill.

The woman has a headache and I felt weak. She decided that it was due to the new cure for back pain. However, about 8 in the morning, on break, she got worse. A colleague ran over a piece of bread with honey for Tiffany, but when he returned, he noticed that she changed countenance: his left side went numb, the woman could not utter a word. There was no doubt: she has a stroke.

It happened 350 metres from Froedtert Hospital, a leading center for the treatment of strokes. Tate could deliver there for a few moments.

Why patients may not take in the nearest hospital

The emergency Department, even if it is walking distance from the place where the victim is not always able to accept it. The medical center may be overloaded, or it is decided that the ambulance should go to another place. Officially it is called «allocation of ambulance» (ambulance diversion).

This distribution is the hospital doing for 2 reasons:

  • due to the large influx of patients
  • due to a well-established system to move patients through the corridors of the institution.

If the first all is clear: the hospital can not physically take the patient, because it just isn’t a place, then to the second point, there are questions. When in the corridors of the emergency room there are obstacles for emergency of new patients, this problem the administration is unable to solve on their own.

What happened to Tiffany Tate

The ambulance, which carried Tiffany Tate, due to ambulance diversion took her to Aurora West Allis Medical Center, 3 miles from the Milwaukee Regional Medical Center. There, in contrast to Froedtert Hospital, provide only partial assistance to the stroke and therefore unable to help the woman. Tiffany was sent to Aurora St. Luke’s Medical Center, where she arrived 3.5 hours after she had the signs of a stroke. Doctors have lost the time and patient: she died.

The family decided to figure out what caused this tragedy.

«Damn, she was at Froedtert. She works there. It was right there» — indignantly said in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel brother of the deceased David Tate.

«I miss her. I just yearn for it, said Alvin Blalock, Tiffany’s boyfriend and father of their 5-year-old son Alex. — She left too early.»

Tiffany Tate collapsed next to the best stroke center in Milwaukee. The ambulance was turned away — by policy. And she died.
Our investigation into ambulance diversions launches today. #TurnedAway https://t.co/uNRYjNsWfS @js_watchdog @kcrowebasspro pic.twitter.com/5HWGIPh12U

— John Diedrich (@john_diedrich) January 17, 2019

Michael Cart, medical Director of Public Citizen, previously worked in the Ministry of health and social services, said that the delay in delivery of the Tate in the center of the highest level, specializing in stroke, nullified the chances of the patient for salvation.

«I think it is highly likely that [the wire] have contributed to the adverse outcome,» he told Kare, noting that the first 3 hours are the most important for the patient with stroke.

Every year in the US, stroke kills more than 140 thousand people. This is the 5th most common cause of death among Americans and a leading cause of serious, long-term disability.

Professor, University of California San Francisco Maria Raven, studying ambulance diversion in emergency departments, believes that, given the sad statistics, Tate should have been brought in Froedtert Hospital is the main centre for the treatment of strokes in the area.

«In my opinion, they should not be considered a comprehensive center for stroke, if [at any time] may refuse to accept,’ said the Raven. — People cannot control when they have a panic attack».

On whose side the law

The law on emergency medical care requires hospitals to accept anyone who comes to the emergency Department. The same applies to persons on the medical campus. But where does it end?

According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, according to the Federal regulations, the campus includes the area within a radius of 250 yards surrounding the main hospital building. However, it does not include non-medical institutions, such as souvenir shops or hospital canteens. In the case of Tiffany Tate formal law was not violated.

With regard to the distribution of the ambulance, in the County of Milwaukee in 2016 this practice officially abolished. However, it de facto remained not only in his state but across the country.

According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, no uniform set of rules regulates how and when hospitals USA to distribute ambulance.

This practice emerged in the 1980’s, when many hospitals were so overcrowded that patients for hours or even days lying on beds in the corridors of the emergency Department waiting for admission or discharge. Over the past 15 years the number of visits to emergency departments increased by 20 percent to 137 million in 2018, with 114 million in 2003.

Defenders of ambulance diversion call it a «necessary evil» that protects patients from a long and dangerous wait in a crowded hospital. The goal of redistribution is to deliver the patient the ambulance in the less loaded compartment with the same capabilities.

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