This! Are they going on the patient’s (or family’s) word? Are they looking it up on a statewide covid vaccination registry (my state has one, and it’s inaccurate)? And are overworked hospital staff taking up time to find verification of vaccination status?
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Doctors have the same right to comment on matters of public interest as anyone else. There is no suggestion that patient confidentiality was breached nor should you imply otherwise.
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And to make sure there is equal access to healthcare services for all. After seeing all the social media connections and activity around this instance, that was the point. How many people would have gotten the results that this family did. There was no sharing of any private data. All the information is public access. Heck, if you live in the area you probably know who this person is. But if a 65 year-old average Joe from Podunk USA needed an ECMO machine, would he have gotten it? And to see the actions of the family before and during this whole scenario smacks of elitism. No one is is VIP when it comes to healthcare rights and access. Everyone is a VIP.
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I am part of a nursing forum. We discuss any and all things that are in the news and have been put out in the public arena by patients themselves. We do NOT identify our own patients. There is nothing wrong with discussing ethics in medicine and behavior of people who have put themselves out into the public by doing news interviews or making posts where they identify themselves on social media. Joe Schmo gets to discuss public figures and news stories, and so do doctors, nurses, or any other healthcare professionals as long as they are not identifying their own patients and violating those patients’ privacy.
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Physicians have every right to discuss people on a FB page if those people have identified themselves by going on CNN or making their identities known through social media or any other public venue and/or they are not their OWN patients. They can discuss other patients as long as no identifying information is disclosed. On my nursing message board, we have a whole forum where we can discuss news stories and nursing issues that have been brought to the public realm. We can talk about patient behavior or other issues as long as we are very careful to avoid disclosing any information that could identify the patient. That is a whole other issue than disclosing PHI of identified people who prefer to remain anonymous.
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And that is what happened here. These physicians were on the sidelines in the local area and saw the social media posts and the calls for action by the family. No one knew the man was sick or in the hospital. No one was taking care of him. But then the calls for help started going out and the images on social media of the plane taking off. And people started wondering what happened here. Someone posted there are no ECMO beds in the entire state of Florida up to Virginia. People are looking to transfer patients but can’t. And then they see this happening. I understand this is America and this stuff happens and it should not be surprising to anyone. And everyone wants this family to have a happy ending. But this happy ending should be available to all and it is not. So how can we make this happen for everyone? It’s an observation and a reminder that everyone should be treated equally. And what can we as a society do to make that happen? It’s a discussion worth having in any forum, public or private.
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I think some are discussing denying treatment and others are talking rationing treatment.
Hopefully everyone would agree that no one should be denied treatment, but when it comes to rationing treatment (which is what’s going on when beds aren’t available), being rich and loud shouldn’t move people to the front of the line.
I’m personally of the belief that being unvaxxed (and able to be vaxxed) during a time of rationing should put one further back in line.
I’d feel the same about being a smoker if smoking issues were clogging the system or pretty much anything else folks have mentioned in this thread, including things like putting the speeding or drunk driver at the back of the line if they caused the accident sending multiple people to the hospital at once and overwhelming the system.
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I agree with this whole heartedly. It’s a difficult problem. But I am guessing that anyone here who was in a life or death situation with yourself or a family member would do whatever it takes for yourself or family member. Not saying it’s right but it’s human nature.
Sincere question:
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Drunk driver gets behind the wheel of a car to drive home. Causes an accident and is injured. Does the drunk driver deserve to be treated?
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A smoker spends much time smoking indoors at home and in his car with family members and others. All family members and others are at risk due to second hand smoke. The smoker gets lung cancer. Does the smoker deserve treatment?
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A thief enters a store , pulls a gun to rob the cashier. The cashier uses a gun to defend themselves and shoots the thief in the leg. Does the thief deserve treatment?
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A tour bus driver has been up too long but has a bus tour today. He thinks he’s fine so starts the tour. Falls asleep at the wheel crashing the bus injuring many of his passengers and himself. Does the bus driver deserve treatment?
5 A person has decided not to get the Covid vaccine. Don’t know their reasons, maybe valid reasons, maybe no valid reason. This person gets Covid. Does this person deserve treatment?
In every scenario above the person made a bad irresponsible choice that affected the health and well being of others. Infuriating, yes! But, in my opinion, all deserve treatment. It will be a very bad time If we start having people decide who gets treatment based on how people judged our actions. Who gets to be judge and jury?
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Thank you. Yes, everyone deserves treatment. Part of the confusion in this case is that no one knows what happened and in Florida, there are limited resources for all, including now oxygen apparently? People die waiting for beds. There was a retired military man in Houston who died from gallstone pancreatitis waiting for a bed. I guess what happened with the instance in Florida is that people assume that the Covid situation is as bad nationally as it is locally. If there are many available beds in CT for people to transfer to, and they are going unused, then by all means someone should grab that bed and get treatment. But the people in Florida probably think the situation in CT is just as bad and that there was only 1 bed available and that the man from Florida got it. So perceptions are different. There’s someone on this forum who said beds are not so scare in CT so that is reassuring that resources are not being taken from the local people.
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I just heard an interesting perspective. A Dr. in our area was talking about hospitals with a shortage of beds. He said that in our area the shortage of beds was more related to a shortage of staff than a significant increase in in beds used.
Some hospitals lost staff to people not willing to get vaccinated. He said that locally they are also losing nurses to be traveling nurses due to the very high pay being offered. Thus, fewer overall beds are available.
If this is in fact true, just hearing that beds are full is not enough information. I would also want to know how many beds there are compared to how many available compared to how many beds there were prepandemic. Background information is so important when interpreting numbers.
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Here are my sincere questions back to you.
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The drunk driver hit your wife and kids. All require surgery, but there’s only one surgeon and one operating room available. Some will die without immediate surgery. Are you ok with the drunk driver getting surgery ahead of your kids?
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You are young and otherwise healthy but need a lung transplant due to inadvertent asbestos exposure. The smoker develops lung cancer and also needs a transplant, and has been smoking even while waiting for a transplant. An transplant becomes available. One of you will die without the transplant. Are you ok with the smoker getting it ahead of you?
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Your kid was shot in a drive by. He arrives at the hospital at the same as your robber with only one doctor available. Are you ok with the robber being seen first?
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Same as above, the kids in the accident need immediate care with only one doctor available. Should the driver get care first and allow the kids to die?
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A firefighter needs an ECMO machine. The anti-vaxxer shows up at the hospital at the same time. As the doctor do you give it to the anti-vaxxer?
Your scenarios are assuming unlimited resources in a perfect world. The current world is very far from perfect with extremely limited resources.
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The problem is shortage of ICU nurses and respiratory specialists in general (not loss to travel or quitting) - due to unprecedented numbers of patients requiring this level of care. Beds can be converted, but nurses can’t be trained so quickly.
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Medical triage has always been based on the most severe cases. Like it or not that’s how it’s done. No time to stop and ask who the bad guy is. Maybe some Drs will stop and try to make that determination. In your scenarios medical triage will in fact be making the decisions.
And in your scenarios, decisions do need to be made.
All Drs I know will do everything in their power to save all. The cavalier attitude of unvaccinated don’t deserve treatment, or the unvaccinated shouldn’t get to go to the hospital is completely out of the realm of my compassion and care of all.
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Yep. All reasons for shortages.
This isn’t true for organ donor lists.
For those, considerations of comorbidities, age, lifestyle and other factors determine who gets the life-saving organ. You don’t give a kidney to the sickest person. You give it to the person for whom, odds are, it will do the most good. Children get priority, as do parents of young children. You can’t buy your way to first in line on a donor list.
If the medical triage being done is determining literally who dies between two people, my understanding is there is a rigid hierarchy of considerations. Social connections and wealth aren’t on the hierarchy.
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And yet David Crosby was able to get a liver transplant …
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Just because something has always been done a certain way doesn’t mean it’s the best way to continue doing it. It doesn’t take long to assess a situation when one is talking rationing care.
So you are in favor of rationing care based on lifestyle and lifestyle choices. Very slippery slope. Ration care to the unvaccinated may lead to rationing care to the smoker (the smoker may be your family member) may lead to rationing care to the drunk driver (the driver may be your family member), then rationing care to all criminals (unvaccinated are not criminals). Criminal statistics show that statistically crime is higher among minorities. Oops, now we are rationing care among POC if they have a criminal record.
Very….slippery……slope!!!
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To you, maybe. To me, no, not at all. Rationing care due to short supplies (of things or staff), by definition, means hard decisions have to be made. It’s not an ideal world where everyone can get what they need.
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