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ORLANDO, Fla. -- A Sanford mother says she will never be able to hold her newborn because an Orlando hospital performed a life-altering surgery and, she claims, the hospital refuses to explain why they left her as a multiple amputee.
The woman filed a complaint against Orlando Regional Healthcare Systems, she said, because they won't tell her exactly what happened. The hospital maintains the woman wants to know information that would violate other patients' rights.
Claudia Mejia gave birth eight and a half months ago at Orlando Regional South Seminole. She was transported to Orlando Regional Medical Center in Orlando where her arms and legs were amputated. She was told she had streptococcus, a flesh eating bacteria, and toxic shock syndrome, but no further explanation was given.
The hospital, in a letter, wrote that if she wanted to find out exactly what happened, she would have to sue them.
I want to know what happened. I went to deliver my baby and I came out like this, Mejia said.
Mejia said after she gave birth to Mathew last spring, she was kept in the hospital with complications. Twelve days after giving birth at Orlando Regional South Seminole hospital, she was transported to Orlando Regional Medical Center where she became a quadruple amputee. Now she can not care for or hold her baby.
Yeah, I want to pick him up. He wants me to pick him up. I can't. I want to, but I can't, she said. Woke up from surgery and I had no arms and no legs. No one told me anything. My arms and legs were just gone.
Her 7-year-old son, Jorge, asks his mother over and over what happened to her. Neither she nor her husband has the answer.
I love her, so I'll always stick with her and take it a day at a time myself, said her husband, Tim Edwards.
The couple wants to know how she caught streptococcus, during labor or after. She doesn't know. She knows she didn't leave the hospital the same.
And why, I want to know why this happened, she said.
Her attorney, Judy Hyman wrote ORHS a letter saying, according to the Florida statute, The Patients Right To Know About Adverse Medical Incidents Act, the hospital must give her the records.
When the statute is named 'Patients Right To Know,' I don't know how it could be clearer, Hyman said.
The hospital's lawyers wrote back, Ms. Mejia's request may require legal resolution. In other words, according to their interpretation of the law, Mejia has to sue them to get information about herself.
That's the sticking point, the interpretation of the Patients Right To Know act, a constitutional amendment Florida voters passed a little more than a year ago.
Mejia's other attorney, E. Clay Parker, said the hospital is not following the law
We were forced to file this and ask a judge to interpret the constitutional amendment and do right, Parker said.
Mejia hopes the right thing is done. She said not knowing exactly why it happened is unbearable. She only hopes she'll be able to soon answer her little boy's question, 'What happened?'
He told me everyday, 'What happened,' and I don't have any answers for that, she said.
ORMC said Mejia is requesting information on if there were other patients or someone on her floor with the streptococcus. They said, if they release that to her, that would be a violation of other patients' rights.
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http://www.wftv.com/news/6253589/detail.html
o my i dont even know what to say
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That's so messed up...
no matter what type of information they give her, they can never give back her arms or legs..
They should at least try to help her, just tossing her out like that with no information.
She deserves an answer at least.
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what is world turning into these days.... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/unsure.gif)
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ahh yea it's bad..this is old news though, remember reading about it on here before..wonder if she got any money out of it yet
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this is so typical of the Floridian Health Care system.
this happens so often, and then it ends up in court, and then the hospital pays right before the final verdict. So typical (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)
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They better pay LOADS of money!
Shoot, even a billion dollars can never repay a missing arm or leg. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)
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OMG that is fcked UP...
wow.. i can't believe it.. they just amputated her arms and legs like that..
wtf kind of hospital are they running over there!?
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Wow! I know it costs an arm and a leg to have a baby in Canada but man, the States are twice as expensive!
(IMG:style_emoticons/default/sweatingbullets.gif)
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Wow...and I thought you can trust the Doctors.
I feel bad for the women though =/
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Wow! I know it costs an arm and a leg to have a baby in Canada but man, the States are twice as expensive!
(IMG:style_emoticons/default/sweatingbullets.gif)
^
LMAO.
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that is so freaken f*ed up!!!!!!
im supporting her in suing the living shiot out of that hospital!!!!
freak!!!!!!
even if she couldnt make the decision, they should at least told her husband!!!
im hella mad now!!!!!
darn you darn doctors!!!
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thats so messed up wth ! i would be so pissed like..the hospital must be so stupid and obviously covering something up like having one limb amputated is bad enough but now wth ... that woman should sue i would .. just to get information about myself thats so messed up
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ek! ... I'm glad that I live in Canada....
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That's completely BS. I mean, she should have the right to know what happened to her.
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Wait, she came out of the operating room without knowing how her arms and legs were amputated? What the, that is so messed up...maybe it was the wrong patient...
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what the freak?!?! she loses her arm and legs without explanation?!?!! omg!! (-.-);; i hope something good happens to help her.. that is so wrong....
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Omg thats so sad, i teared up when she said she wanted to hold her baby but she couldnt
The f*ck is wrong with that hospital!
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Omg thats so sad, i teared up when she said she wanted to hold her baby but she couldnt
The f*ck is wrong with that hospital!
o snap ur post total is 666
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ugh what is wrong with that hospital? they should at least inform her or her husband before they just amputate all her limbs. and they should at least tell her whats going on (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sleep.gif) what kind of a hospital is this.. ugh.
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man thats so wrong
while theyre the ones who said no violation against a patients right, they already violated another directly
id sue them. id sue them for sure
and id be dead pist if it the operation was meant for another patient..... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ph34r.gif)
