"My brother died in the hospital alone, covered in blood and abandoned in a deposit among the ants"

"Dear Union,

I am writing to tell how my brother died in the hospital, last September and therefore in the period of Covid.

I am writing because I would like to point out that it is not Covid that kills, but medical malpractice and the rules that hospitals have in case of hospitalization.

In this case I am speaking, unfortunately, of a Sardinian hospital and of the emergency medicine department.

On September 5th we called the ambulance because my brother was losing blood from the esophagus and having undergone a total laryngectomy we thought that the best solution was the hospitalization in the same structure where he had previously been operated on.

Once in the emergency room, however, I lost contact with my brother. They did not let me go with him and they told me that they would notify me in case of hospitalization. After hours of phone calls to the emergency room where no one answered, I then discovered that my brother had been hospitalized in emergency medicine. Worse than ever ... the whole family tried to contact the ward with no answers.

Fortunately my brother was fine and we were able to communicate with him through messages because we couldn't hear each other because we had no voice. He asked us for the stuff to change, the wi-fi connection and above all his medicines which he absolutely should not skip taking because he was following a chemo for the liver and if he didn't take them for just one day he would go into encephalopathy which would have led him to coma and the risk of death.

I left everything at the hospital entrance, and the delivery took place in the evening after 20.30. He was hospitalized in a storage room where there was not even an alarm bell. In short, in summary, my brother was left there where he then fell to go to the bathroom with a fracture of the nasal septum.

He could no longer walk. Nobody gave him his vital therapy. Nobody helped him to go to the bathroom. Nobody cleaned it and changed it. Nobody helped him charge his cell phone. For days he did not respond to messages, and doctors to phone calls. I showed up several times to explain the situation and get news but they said I could only get news by phone, from 1pm to 2pm. Once a doctor said that my brother was fine and was responding well to antibiotic therapy. It was strange though, his silence. Then, after eight days of hospitalization, at 8 pm they called us from the hospital to tell us that we could come and see him because he was not very well. I immediately rushed to the hospital and at 8.30 I managed to see him. Desert block. There was no doctor or nurse, I was completely lost. Knocking from door to door I managed to reach him, and I saw a terrifying scene.

My brother was lying in his bed in a room / storage where there were computers thrown away in the corner. He was was completely dirty with stale blood in the esophagus. His dirty clothes were still on while the clean ones, which I had brought him, thrown on the ground in a shopping bag surrounded by ants that also arrived on his bed. Her vital medicines never touched: they were still in the bag as I had put them. The cell phone was off and the PC out of his reach. His face was a mess with the wounds still evident from the fall.

I immediately sought a doctor but there was none. When my brother saw me at first he did not recognize me because I had to wear a hat, shoe covers and dressing gown. Then he looked me in the eye, heard my voice and said with tears in his eyes: 'Are you my sister?'. He immediately told me that he wanted to go to the bathroom and he was so thirsty: I gave him water with a straw in the bottle that he could not reach. He drank like he was in a desert. With all my strength I was able to put him on his feet because he could not go to the body lying down with the cloth. He was conscious and aware that if he didn't pass out at least once a day he would go into encephalopathy. And he was already 6 days that he was not going just because they did not give him his medicines. Reluctantly, I was unable to take him to the bathroom and with great effort put him back in bed. I screamed all over the ward asking for help to give me a hand, but no one answered: it felt like living in a nightmare.

I left my brother sleeping at 11.30pm. I promised him that the next morning my sister would come to clean and take care of him given the situation and the condition in which they were leaving him abandoned. In the morning at 7.30 a call arrives announcing the death of my brother.

How is it possible to let a human being die alone, in a hospital where there is no staff, where he is not followed, where they prevent us from entering and perhaps make sure to help the same staff?

My brother was left abandoned in a warehouse without a bell ... he who didn't even have a voice to scream and ask for help.

But where is the health? Where and how are we living? The anger is too big and I want to let everyone know how my brother died. Not for illness but for medical malpractice.

He who has won so many wars and together we have overcome them. He who had a great desire to live. He the warrior Beppe ”.

Signed letter *

(* details, to the knowledge of the editorial staff, are omitted in respect of privacy and in accordance with current legislation)

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