Sorry. Given my schedule lately and the speed with which this thread is moving, I'm way, way late in responding to this post. And, I haven't had time to get caught up with the new posts so, something similar may have already been posted.
At first glance, I get the emotion behind the original post, and the genuine sympathy it displays for a mother in pain as she mourns her young daughter. If I follow the story in the sentence on its face, it speaks of multiple betrayals and anger with a vague entity being held responsible for the death of the child. That said, although the overwhelming pain that NW is suffering is only too real, there are a number of assumptions upon which the sentence is based that, IMO, when examined a little, are not necessarily supported by what we know so far about the events that led to Jahi's tragic death.
First. IMO, we don't actually know how the hospital handled the McMath case because the family has prevented the hospital from releasing the details which would complete the picture, and because the people who work in CHO have adhered to HIPPA. Most of the details that we do have, I believe, have largely been made public by the family, the family's lawyer, and the family's spokesman (Omari Sealey) in interviews and press conferences. IIRC, details from a CHO staff perspective have filtered through to us via court documents prepared by CHO legal advisors, public letters of condolence to the family, and limited public responses in press conferences.
Re: the 'spokesman'. I'm not sure to which of the men and women who make public statements on behalf of CHO you refer. It could be that in an effort to remain neutral in a very inflammatory situation, a choice was made to use clinical language or a dispassionate tone which may have seemed cold rather than compassionate. I'm not sure if it was the content of the message or the style of delivery which you found unsatisfactory--or both. Sometimes a person used to deliver statements on behalf of one section of an organization may be fine, but he or she may not be successful when delivering statements on behalf of a different section or about a different subject. Given that the negative reaction in the post may be representative of many people in the public sector, my guess is that the role of CHO representative will be reassigned.
When "the hospital" or "they" are used to refer to CHO, they tend to become a blanket terms which include every nurse, doctor, technician, security guard, accountant, physiotherapist, counsellor, pastor, aide, receptionist, social worker, housekeeper, cook, fundraiser, lawyer, entertainer, resident, student nurse, board member, candy-striper and gift shop volunteer who works at CHO.
It may be easy to just use the term "the hospital" since NW has done so, but it is too broad a reference, IMO. Further, as has been so eloquently discussed up thread, it is an inaccurate term. Its indiscriminate use by MSM has done a lot of damage to the reputations of the people who work at CHO. After NW's interviews, the slur on the people who work at CHO is no longer implied. In her ktvu unedited interview NW said "everybody in here is gonna cover up because they all work together. This is their hospital, so I know they're gonna try to cover up something in there 'cause something definitely happened wrong to my child in there." In her anger and pain, it seems that for NW "the hospital" has become a term to evoke a heartless institution staffed by dishonest, uncaring people who cannot be trusted to speak the truth. It saddens me that OS, the lawyer, and many people in MSM have followed suit.
Who is the "they" who said the child would have a better life after this complex surgery? IIRC, the mother said this in an interview as an explanation of why her daughter was undergoing the procedure. (
http://blog.al.com/wire/2013/12/california_girl_declared_brain.html) If it was not the mother's own choice of words, did someone make this an unqualified promise to the mother before Jahi was scheduled for the surgery? Who said it? Was it the family g.p.? If someone from CHO made this statement to NW, who was it? A surgeon? A resident? A paediatric consultant?
From all accounts, Jahi was a lovely child who was suffering from medical issues that interfered with her ability to sleep, to study, to focus, and to control her urination. For a girl described by her mom as shy, this must have been very difficult to deal with. IMO, NW deeply loved Jahi, and would have only wanted to make her daughter's life a better one. However, I don't believe that anyone from the hospital promised Jahi would have a better quality of life following the surgery in order to lure NW into making the decision for Jahi to have the operation. OS has said that Jahi had undergone two previous attempts to solve her apnea and other problems, which does underscore that Jahi's health was of concern to her family and that NW had been searching for a medical solution to the problems Jahi was encountering.
Re "
in their ICU, on their watch
" As has been discussed in the previous threads, all surgery has risks and every guardian of minor children who are patients, receive warnings about the possibility that complications could arise. According to many posts upthread and in previous threads, they also receive specific instructions regarding the behaviour of family members in the PICU. How many family members are allowed to be with a child in PICU at the same time? What is the decorum to be observed? When is it appropriate for family members to give food to PICU patients? Where can that food be obtained? Is is acceptable for family members to render treatment to the young patient or is treatment limited to the medical staff of CHO? What is the ratio of nurses to patients in the PICU? Is there a doctor on hand?
What happened between the time Jahi woke up following her surgery and the time it was determined that she had suffered brain death is unclear to me. The timing and sequence of events, even the length of time it took for things to unfold has varied in different accounts. In order to know the times of events, and the actual nature of the events, the public will need information from CHO staff which is currently unavailable due to the family's insistence and HIPPA. According to Jahi's uncle, Jahi woke up and was able to ask for and receive a popsicle--I haven't read where the popsicle came from. As well, OS has said that, Jahi, her mother, grandmother and stepfather at various times suctioned the blood from Jahi's mouth and throat. At some point NW lost consciousness and was herself admitted as a patient at CHO. OS has also said that the nurses performed transfusions in an effort to help Jahi, and that a doctor (not her surgeon) was present. We need much more information before we can condemn the actions and efforts of the medical staff out of hand. Yes, something happened "on their watch". In fact, with NW fainting, and other family members trying to help, it sounds like quite a lot was happening. It will be very interesting to read the time line that emerges when the nurses' notes are eventual made public.
There is another statement from which the family lawyer, NW and OS are getting a lot of mileage: "dead, dead, dead". IIRC, OS and NW have attributed it to Dr. Durand, Chief of Pediatrics at CHO. (I'll go back over the different articles and see if I can find the specific reference.) It seems out of character for someone who allowed so many accommodations to be made for NW's family by the staff in his section. However, even if it is true, that does not excuse the media and others from branding the entire CHO staff as callous and indifferent to Jahi's tragedy because one person said this phrase. The entire staff of CHO did not say this to NW. Certainly the nurses and aides and therapists and techs who have cared for Jahi's remains so well that an illusion of life was preserved did not ever say this to her. This phrase has further blackened the reputation of the men and women who have done their job and not defended themselves from the tactics of the family's lawyer or the attacks by media or members of the public. Continuing to malign the staff of CHO is unconscionable, IMO. But the phrase has legs. I just googled "dead dead dead Jahi" and got 92, 300, 000 results.
I don't recall seeing a confirmation of who broke the news of Jahi's death to NW and in what way that news was broken. We don't know how many kindly nurses, soft spoken social workers, reassuring pastors, older doctors, or sympathetic volunteers may have spoken with her. We don't know if someone just laid out the technical terms of what was happening to Jahi's body. We do not know who referred to Jahi's body as the body or the corpse, or in what context that was said. However it was said, IMO someone as fragile as NW may well have felt that "they talk about my child with no compassion. And I'm like, this is Childrens' Hospital. You should have the utmost compassion for me, especially in ICU." (ktvu interview) However, I wonder whether the language to which NW so strongly objected was being said not in the hospital by the nurses, aides, therapists and technicians who gave physical care to Jahi's body but rather by doctors trying to explain to NW and the family just what brain death was, and by CHO lawyers who were explaining Jahi's physical state to a court of law in clinical terms. IMO, NW's use of the word "they" is being interpreted too loosely, and too many people are being wrongly accused of not caring about Jahi and her family.
There's a reason that we don't yet know the a lot of the information we want to know about the treatments received by Jahi and the discussions held with NW. It is because, IMO, the meetings and conversations were, in fact, held privately and the information protected by HIPPA and the family's demand is still being kept private by staff of CHO.
