Welcome to Texas, the only state where “standard of care” has been replaced by “consulting a lawyer while the patient bleeds out.” The Texas Medical Board has finally broken its silence on the deaths of Nevaeh Crain and Porsha Ngumezi, and their solution is exactly what you’d expect from a state that considers a 99-year prison sentence a reasonable “incentive” for doctors. After ProPublica did the heavy lifting of investigating how these women were left to die in hospital hallways, the board swooped in to issue the medical equivalent of a “Please Don’t Do That Again” sticker.
In the case of 18-year-old Nevaeh Crain, Dr. Ali Mohamed Osman apparently mistook life-threatening sepsis for a common case of strep throat and sent her home with antibiotics. Hours later, Dr. William Noel Hawkins saw her with a 103-degree fever and a fetus with a racing heart and decided she was totally fine to leave. By the time she hit her third ER visit, doctors were so terrified of the state’s bounty-hunter abortion laws that they insisted on two ultrasounds to prove the fetus was dead before they’d even consider saving the girl. Shockingly, waiting for a double-feature of “No Heartbeat” resulted in Nevaeh dying with the fetus still inside her.
Then there’s Porsha Ngumezi, who had the audacity to have a miscarriage in a Houston-area hospital. Instead of performing a standard D&C to stop her from hemorrhaging, Dr. Andrew Ryan Davis gave her some pills and decided to “monitor” the situation while she literally emptied her circulatory system onto the floor. The board confirmed this was a massive “oopsie” that led to her death, but hey, it’s not like there’s a manual for this stuff, right? Oh wait, there is. It’s called medical school.
So, what is the price of two human lives in the Great State of Texas? Eight hours of continuing education. That’s right. While the families are planning funerals and filing lawsuits, these doctors are being “punished” with a single workday’s worth of PowerPoint slides. I’ve spent more time stuck in traffic on Loop 289 than these guys will spend learning how not to let a teenager die of sepsis.
It’s heartening to see the Texas Medical Board take such a firm stand: if you fail to provide basic, life-saving care because you’re scared of a poorly written law, you might have to give up a Saturday afternoon to get a certificate of completion.
Does anyone know if that eight-hour course includes a module on how to look a grieving husband in the eye, or is that saved for the advanced elective?
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