La Paz, September 25, 2023 (ATB Digital). – Emiliana Flores returned to Bolivia after many years in Argentina and was involved in a traffic accident. He entered El Alto’s Agramonte Hospital with broken ribs and jaw and died from infection and pneumonia. The hospital held his body for nine hours.
The story of Flores-Miranda’s family is similar to that of many Bolivian immigrants who seek opportunities in other countries in the region. Despite spending almost 40 years in Argentina, Emiliana wants to return to her homeland, where she will once again put on a dress and a Borsalino hat.
However, her life reached its peak at the Agramonte Hospital, to which Bolivian police transport personnel referred her after the Santiago Apostol transport convoy in which she was traveling had an accident near Quime. Seven people died there and dozens were injured.
“Our misfortune began on August 2,” begins the story of Emiliana’s daughter, Gregoria Miranda, who came from Argentina to care for her mother. Next to Gregoria is David, another of three brothers who recently lost their mother. Javier is the third child.
“We did not choose to have him admitted. We never refused to pay or comply with the doctors’ orders, although they missed us many times,” Gregoria explains.
Her brother David, a nurse, said the first thing that caught his attention two days after Emiliana’s intervention was suspended because staff had apparently served her breakfast had caused her blood sugar levels to be high was the doctor’s insistence. The patient is thought to have undergone two surgeries on the same day; one to repair his broken ribs and the other to reconstruct his jaw.
“She has diabetes, which is under control, but it’s a significant underlying condition, and she’s 70 years old. As a precaution, our family decided to only operate on his ribs first,” David said.
Gradually, the violations and abuse began to accumulate. On August 17, the drainage tube originally used to filter fluid from the lungs was removed. On the same day, they discovered that Emiliana had severe pneumonia, which was not detected. She was admitted to the intensive care unit and intubated the next day. On the 27th, they performed a tracheotomy.
David noted that they started antibiotic treatment before they knew exactly what bacteria caused the pneumonia, and it took several days to learn the test results that showed this. Although he was taking medication, they discovered on the 29th that he had an infection.
Gregoria summed up how the situation worsened: “They gave my brother a list of medications to buy in front of my mother, who was distressed about the cost, which made us even more noisy.” They were then first told that their The mother had five broken ribs, and they paid for five titanium plates; later after the surgery, they claimed there were six, not realizing the patient developed severe pneumonia.
“I think the staff cleaned the wound from the surgery; because oddly enough, while he was on very strong antibiotics for pneumonia, he developed an infection, and those medications have been changed twice,” David explained .
According to reports, Dr. José Antonio VS reacted sarcastically and sarcastically to the family’s request for information, and after the incident, the latter decided to provide their medical history to the Office of the Ombudsman and allow them to be transferred from the hospital to Emiliana.
At a hearing on September 7, Agramonte Hospital agreed to do so. Emiliana was hospitalized for more than 30 days. From the beginning, her family argued about whether she should change medical centers, but Agramonta Hospital never provided them with her medical history, even after her death.
On September 11, the patient’s kidneys began to fail, they had detected a problem with her stomach, and doctors announced that she likely would not survive that night. Emiliana is available until September 13th.
“Four of us arrived at his room in the intensive care unit: Javier, my father, my uncle and me,” Gregoria explained. “We started touching her and she was warm and Dr. Veruz was in the room and didn’t turn to us until the staff there told him we had arrived. “He made us think he was alive, only to tell us he had passed away. . “
Emiliana died at 7:00 a.m., and they were not allowed to remove her body until around 5:00 p.m., after the family signed a pledge that they would repay what was owed after spending a similar amount. Over Sh100,000. , slightly higher, among all the medications, research, and supplies the medical center needs.
The Second Anti-Corruption and Violence against Women Court of El Alto declared admissible the liberal case filed by the Office of the Ombudsman against the Agramonte hospital. The court ruled that hospital management must publicly apologize to the family for illegally withholding Emiliana’s body.
“So far they have not apologized and the most important thing for us is that they provided us with their medical history. This hospital has a lot of history and we don’t want this to happen to anyone else. Nothing can be done to Our mothers gave it back to us, but we wanted to leave a precedent,” Gregoria concluded.
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