who's paying the medical bills for this dead person?

[DukeNukeEm]

In Oakland a girl died after a botched surgery or something. The doctors pronounced her dead but the family insists she's alive, biology seems to side with the doctors. Anyways, the dead girl is getting some pretty ludicrous medical care to keep her heart "beating". This isn't cheap and I don't think health insurance extends to dead people. Who pays for this s***? This has been going on for weeks, if they have the money to pay for it themselves fine but unless they're ludicrously wealthy that's not possible. I read they want operations done on the corpse now, which makes no sense.

 

The kid is dead, theyre probably sad about it, but I'm more concerned with who's paying for this kid to basically decompose while hooked up to a bunch of machines,

[Reddy]

In Oakland a girl died after a botched surgery or something. The doctors pronounced her dead but the family insists she's alive, biology seems to side with the doctors. Anyways, the dead girl is getting some pretty ludicrous medical care to keep her heart "beating". This isn't cheap and I don't think health insurance extends to dead people. Who pays for this s***? This has been going on for weeks, if they have the money to pay for it themselves fine but unless they're ludicrously wealthy that's not possible. I read they want operations done on the corpse now, which makes no sense.

 

The kid is dead, theyre probably sad about it, but I'm more concerned with who's paying for this kid to basically decompose while hooked up to a bunch of machines,

You're such a sweetheart.

 

[EvilMonkey]

OK, maybe not the most caring way he could have phrased that question, but really, who IS paying for that? if it is on the public dime, at what point do we accept medical diagnosis that she is indeed dead and beyond recovery?

[Balta1701]

OK, maybe not the most caring way he could have phrased that question, but really, who IS paying for that? if it is on the public dime, at what point do we accept medical diagnosis that she is indeed dead and beyond recovery?

I think the right answer is probably that the hospital is paying for it but they're doing so because they're compelled by law to pay for it up until a certain point. The family appeared to be an African American family from near Oakland and gave no impression that they're independently wealthy, so the hospital is probably paying for it as part of one of the cases we talk about where hospitals are compelled to admit and pay for anyone who shows up at an ER and can't simply let people die.

 

In the case where either an insurance company can pay or the family can pay, then those groups could continue paying for care as long as they'd want or as long as they're under contract to do so. If they were insured, my guess is that the insurance company would be involved in the legal process regarding removing life support.

 

As far as I can tell the court case has been the hospital against the family, with the family not wanting the hospital to keep the body on life support. That mostly likely tells me that the hospital is the one footing the bill due to a legal compulsion to do so without the permission of the family to remove that support.

[DukeNukeEm]

I think the family pretty clearly wants to keep the kid on life support. The real issue, as I understand it, is the dead girl wont survive the trip to somewhere else without an operation to insert a feeding tube. The hospital doesn't do medical operations on dead people, so the body is stuck there. The hospital is also not a morgue, and I'm guessing the hospital really wants rid of a dead body clogging up resources for the living.

[Balta1701]

I think the family pretty clearly wants to keep the kid on life support. The real issue, as I understand it, is the dead girl wont survive the trip to somewhere else without an operation to insert a feeding tube. The hospital doesn't do medical operations on dead people, so the body is stuck there. The hospital is also not a morgue, and I'm guessing the hospital really wants rid of a dead body clogging up resources for the living.

I can't help but compare this to the case in 2007 where there was a person who had been in a persistent vegetative state for years, had their former spouse wanting them removed from life support and stating those were her wishes, and had an entire political party step in to oppose removing life support.

[DukeNukeEm]

Vegatative state and brain dead are two very different things. Not that I agree with the idea that people should have to be kept alive by machines BCUZ THAS WUT JESUS SEZ 2 DO. Honestly, I think the plug she be pulled on anyone who stands zero medical chance of a recovery that included regaining meaningful consciousness. Why keep people alive like that? If my Mom (god help me if this f***ing happened) was going to be a vegetable just drooling on herself everyone in our family would universally agree to pull the plug. You don't leave some one laying there just waiting to go through the formality of officially dying at that point. Not that they'd even have any concept of "waiting" or anything else.

 

None of that even applies here though. This girl is dead as a doornail. There's no life left.

[Balta1701]

Vegatative state and brain dead are two very different things. Not that I agree with the idea that people should have to be kept alive by machines BCUZ THAS WUT JESUS SEZ 2 DO. Honestly, I think the plug she be pulled on anyone who stands zero medical chance of a recovery that included regaining meaningful consciousness. Why keep people alive like that? If my Mom (god help me if this f***ing happened) was going to be a vegetable just drooling on herself everyone in our family would universally agree to pull the plug. You don't leave some one laying there just waiting to go through the formality of officially dying at that point. Not that they'd even have any concept of "waiting" or anything else.

 

None of that even applies here though. This girl is dead as a doornail. There's no life left.

A vegetative state is accurately described as dead also based on the standard of "there's no life left", the higher functions are all gone, the only difference I see is in the level of automatic responses that the brain can continue doing.

 

The obvious question to ask in reply is "why should you be the person to decide whether someone should be kept alive in those states?" Whether or not I agree with you, it's quite obvious that people would disagree on this matter.

[DukeNukeEm]

f*** those people. Seriously, do they think its going to get any better wasting doctor's time and hospital resources on a corpse? This is why we can't have universal healthcare in this country: "Oh my precious boy is a drooling fleshy paperweight, please spend millions to keep him this way." This is just the American addiction to consumption being allowed a final hurrah in the waning moments of ones life. Its not enough to just die, you gotta die like your EBT glitched out and you have unlimited funds to buy anything you want.

[DukeNukeEm]

And all you do-gooders, you know how much can be done to actually help people with the resources spent maintaining the state of this corpse?

[Balta1701]

The sad thing is, I probably would have agreed with the concept that she should be allowed to die but you make it into the most insanely repulsive concept possible. You make it sound like you'd celebrate.

[Kyyle23]

I can't help but compare this to the case in 2007 where there was a person who had been in a persistent vegetative state for years, had their former spouse wanting them removed from life support and stating those were her wishes, and had an entire political party step in to oppose removing life support.

 

Terri Schiavo

[Balta1701]

Terri Schiavo

(The portions of their family who wanted her life support maintained have issued a statement supporting keeping this patient on life support as well).

[DukeNukeEm]

The sad thing is, I probably would have agreed with the concept that she should be allowed to die but you make it into the most insanely repulsive concept possible. You make it sound like you'd celebrate.

Im not heaping praise on whatever caused a fairly routine minimally invasive surgery to kill someone. What I would commend is a family and medical professionals who agreed that this individuals life is over and spending any effort to preserve it is foolish. What's done is done, this corpse isn't going to spring up and go for a walk.

[Balta1701]

Im not heaping praise on whatever caused a fairly routine minimally invasive surgery to kill someone. What I would commend is a family and medical professionals who agreed that this individuals life is over and spending any effort to preserve it is foolish. What's done is done, this corpse isn't going to spring up and go for a walk.

And about the most basic reaction of a human being should also be to at least take a moment and note some sympathy for the difficult decision that the family is faced with.

[DukeNukeEm]

Its not a decision! Its not! We don't get to decide when people die. Its not up to us.

 

We can try to save people, we can try to give them the best chance to recover but death is death.

[BlackSox13]

My understanding of brain dead ( correct me if im wrong) is there's no oxygen and or blood getting to the brain. If this is true, this girls brain has been without blood/oxygen for weeks so its difficult for me to understand how this girl has any hope of recovery. Hospitals are businesses so you bet the bills will fall on the family and their insurance, at least until the inevitable law suit is settled. What really bothers me is this family refuses to let go despite the brain being dead. I understand they love their daughter and they are good people for that but if the brain is dead you have to let go. I can only hope my wife would do this for me should i ever become brain dead because that's not living and even if by some f***ed up crazy circumstance I would wake from it, I wouldn't be me and would rather not be alive if you could even call it that.

 

I certainly do not mean to judge the family and my heart goes out to them, but if in fact the brain is dead then its time to let go as difficult as it may be.

[Balta1701]

My understanding of brain dead ( correct me if im wrong) is there's no oxygen and or blood getting to the brain. If this is true, this girls brain has been without blood/oxygen for weeks so its difficult for me to understand how this girl has any hope of recovery. Hospitals are businesses so you bet the bills will fall on the family and their insurance, at least until the inevitable law suit is settled. What really bothers me is this family refuses to let go despite the brain being dead. I understand they love their daughter and they are good people for that but if the brain is dead you have to let go. I can only hope my wife would do this for me should i ever become brain dead because that's not living and even if by some f***ed up crazy circumstance I would wake from it, I wouldn't be me and would rather not be alive if you could even call it that.

 

I certainly do not mean to judge the family and my heart goes out to them, but if in fact the brain is dead then its time to let go as difficult as it may be.

I think she's brain dead in the sense of there's no detectable brain function and currently all functions of the body including respiration are being driven by instruments. However, if blood is being pumped through the body and respiration is being sustained artifically then oxygen is being moved through the body to keep the tissues alive. That doesn't mean the brain can function, that doesn't mean there isn't significant damage already, but it is probably enough to slow the deterioration of tissue from this point.

 

However, you're 100% right that there's no hope of recovery. At some point, yes, people will have to let go...but the question of how you can force people to do so is not open and shut.

 

As I said, when it was a white woman in Florida, a significant part of the country thought a condition almost this bad which had gone on for half a decade should continue to be maintained indefinitely regardless of the cost, to the point that there were widespread protests and we had the remarkable spectacle of the Senate Majority leader, a trained M.D., giving a diagnosis on the Senate Floor based on a highly edited couple minute clip of video.

 

I understand completely that the family does not want to let go and I completely agree that there's a point the hospital will need to force them to do so. But it's not a decision that should be made lightly and if the family wants to fight for now, they have that right.

[mr_genius]

I think she's brain dead in the sense of there's no detectable brain function and currently all functions of the body including respiration are being driven by instruments. However, if blood is being pumped through the body and respiration is being sustained artifically then oxygen is being moved through the body to keep the tissues alive. That doesn't mean the brain can function, that doesn't mean there isn't significant damage already, but it is probably enough to slow the deterioration of tissue from this point.

 

However, you're 100% right that there's no hope of recovery. At some point, yes, people will have to let go...but the question of how you can force people to do so is not open and shut.

 

As I said, when it was a white woman in Florida, a significant part of the country thought a condition almost this bad which had gone on for half a decade should continue to be maintained indefinitely regardless of the cost, to the point that there were widespread protests and we had the remarkable spectacle of the Senate Majority leader, a trained M.D., giving a diagnosis on the Senate Floor based on a highly edited couple minute clip of video.

 

I understand completely that the family does not want to let go and I completely agree that there's a point the hospital will need to force them to do so. But it's not a decision that should be made lightly and if the family wants to fight for now, they have that right.

 

i agree

[StrangeSox]

Mike Huckabee links brain dead California girl to Nazi death camps, forced abortions

[EvilMonkey]

I think she's brain dead in the sense of there's no detectable brain function and currently all functions of the body including respiration are being driven by instruments. However, if blood is being pumped through the body and respiration is being sustained artifically then oxygen is being moved through the body to keep the tissues alive. That doesn't mean the brain can function, that doesn't mean there isn't significant damage already, but it is probably enough to slow the deterioration of tissue from this point.

 

However, you're 100% right that there's no hope of recovery. At some point, yes, people will have to let go...but the question of how you can force people to do so is not open and shut.

 

As I said, when it was a white woman in Florida, a significant part of the country thought a condition almost this bad which had gone on for half a decade should continue to be maintained indefinitely regardless of the cost, to the point that there were widespread protests and we had the remarkable spectacle of the Senate Majority leader, a trained M.D., giving a diagnosis on the Senate Floor based on a highly edited couple minute clip of video.

 

I understand completely that the family does not want to let go and I completely agree that there's a point the hospital will need to force them to do so. But it's not a decision that should be made lightly and if the family wants to fight for now, they have that right.

if the original question had been proposed by a poster with a more liberal bent, would you keep bending over backwards to keep bringing Terry Shiavo into this? Somehow I don't think so. Will you have the same reservations when Obamacare starts deciding not to pay for life extending treatment? i mean, how you can force people to let go is not open and shut....

[Balta1701]

if the original question had been proposed by a poster with a more liberal bent, would you keep bending over backwards to keep bringing Terry Shiavo into this? Somehow I don't think so. Will you have the same reservations when Obamacare starts deciding not to pay for life extending treatment? i mean, how you can force people to let go is not open and shut....

Frankly, yes.

 

End of life issues are some of the most complex ones we have to deal with both as a family and as a society. There shouldn't be an easy answer here. The last comparable times we dealt with this were...the Schaivo garbage, which was IMO one of the most embarrassing episodes I've ever seen in public life...and the "death panels" thing.

 

The Schaivo case might well have had some positive effect if it forced people to confront those issues. The PPACA contained language and money to try to help prevent these kind of problems...but "end of life counseling" was termed "death panels" and became a political hit piece, so instead of being able to deal with these problems beforehand we made sure it's even harder to do so and scared people from talking to their families and doctors beforehand.

 

There will never be a simple answer in one of these cases. As a society we should endeavour to prevent them from reaching this point...and when they still do, as in the case of an accident...then a combination of trying to find money, talking to judges, and talking to the hospital is exactly what should happen.

 

Eventually in this legal case either the hospital will win or they'll find some alternative center with a different line of funding willing to keep the body alive. That's how it will happen this time, that's how it should happen, and that's how it's going to happen when the PPACA is fully enforced.

 

The hospital is trying to avoid spending money on the patient. The family doesn't want to lose the patient. Literally the best statement on this case I can give comes from the South Park episode on the Schaivo embarrassment. The hospital is right, but for the wrong reasons. The family is wrong, but for the right reasons.

[DukeNukeEm]

Its been a month. They've been providing medical care to a corpse for a month. This isn't something where it takes a day or two to say goodbye and accept what has already happened, that's understandable. The hospital tried repeatedly to get it through to this family that there was no hope. They declared her legally dead, and I'm no doctor or lawyer but I would assume the legal and medical requisite to being declared dead does not leave much room for interpretation.

[Balta1701]

Its been a month. They've been providing medical care to a corpse for a month. This isn't something where it takes a day or two to say goodbye and accept what has already happened, that's understandable. The hospital tried repeatedly to get it through to this family that there was no hope. They declared her legally dead, and I'm no doctor or lawyer but I would assume the legal and medical requisite to being declared dead does not leave much room for interpretation.

A corpse that a month ago was their daughter or sister, who was having a comparably minor procedure and who's death no one was prepared for. The Schaivo family fought their fight for about 15 years and based on their recent interview they still are dealing with it.

[Iwritecode]

I read this morning that the hospital turned the girl over to the coroner (sp?) who then turned her over to the family.

 

She has a death certificate filled out but they can’t put down the cause yet.

Edited January 6, 2014 by Iwritecode