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AP
Photo provided by the Jennings Police Department Mug shows Anna Brown.
RICHMOND HEIGHTS, Mo. – Officials at a St. Louis hospital on Thursday defended their actions in the case of a homeless woman who sought treatment for a sprained ankle and died in police custody after being arrested for refusing to leave the emergency room.
An autopsy determined that Anna Brown's death in a jail cell in September was caused by blood clots that formed in her legs and migrated to her lungs, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. The newspaper also obtained surveillance footage of the woman's final moments. In the video, officers are seen carrying Brown into a jail cell. The cell door closes and Brown is heard moaning and crying.
Brown's family says authorities treated the 29-year-old mother of two unfairly and have hired a St. Louis-based lawyer, Keith Link. Link did not respond to telephone messages from msnbc.com on Thursday.
St. Mary's Health Center says its staff followed medical guidelines and performed appropriate tests, acknowledging the “outrage being expressed in this tragic event.”
“Unfortunately, even with appropriate testing using sophisticated technology, blood clots can still be undetected in a small number of cases,” according to a statement released by St. Mary's Health Center on Thursday. “The sad reality is that emergency departments across the country are often a place of last resort for many people in our society who suffer from complex social problems that become medical issues when they are not addressed. It is unfortunate that it takes a tragic event like this to call attention to a crisis in our midst.”
Police have said officers had no way of knowing Brown's dire condition.
Brown went to three hospitals complaining of leg pain in the days leading up to her death, including her visit to St. Mary's that led to her arrest for trespassing. She was wheeled out in handcuffs after a doctor said she was healthy enough to be locked up.
Brown had been struggling after a series of devastating setbacks, family say.
'Starting to make progress'
A New Year's Eve tornado in 2010 destroyed Brown's home in north St. Louis home, the Post-Dispatch reported. She and her two children moved to Berkeley, a St. Louis suburb, and she lost her job at a sandwich shop soon afterward, the Post-Dispatch said.
According to the Post-Dispatch, her utilities were shut off because she stopped paying her bills, and after a child welfare agent who visited the home in April found a feces-filled toilet, burn marks on the floor where she had lit fires to keep warm and other distressing signs, Brown was arrested for parental neglect. Police reported at the time that she seemed confused, the newspaper reported.
Her mother, Dorothy Davis, received custody of Brown's children on the condition that Brown couldn't also live with them, and Brown's home was condemned, the newspaper reported. She lived in four homeless shelters from May until September, according to the Post-Dispatch.
Brown joined the St. Louis Empowerment Center, a drop-in center for the mentally ill, the newspaper reported.
"She was just starting to make progress," Kevin Dean, a peer specialist at the center, told the Post-Dispatch.
Dean and another staff member at the drop-in center recalled hearing Anna Brown say she hurt her ankle.
Davis, who said Brown called every day to check on her children, said she wants answers about her daughter's death.
"If the police killed my daughter, I want to know. If the hospital is at fault, I want to know," Davis told the Post-Dispatch. "I want to be able to tell her children why their mother isn't here."
This article includes reporting by The Associated Press.
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This case seems to combine all the diverse issues that are huge problems and need to be fixed: medical care, prisons, environmental concerns and one I didn't notice in this discussion - racial profiling. I too had my life ruined because the state of medical care in this country is horrible. The only reasons I am still alive and better off than MS Brown are: although I had the most expensive and inclusive medical insurance, my insurance refused to pay for tests the doctor needed to treat me, so my condition worsened and by the time I called 911, I arrived DOA at the ER and they were obligated to try to revive me. I now have a physician who treats me for the blood clot condition that was caused by the neglect to the original condition. So I'm luckier than her in this way'
I often worry about the the way the environment is decaying and we never know which catastrophes will occur where and when and I think about things like how will I flush the toilet and how will make a fire to cook and heat water, etc. I've been luckier in that so far, I have only lost telephone service and it's been repaired.
I often worry about how these days, anyone can be accused and thrown in jail and how bad the prison system is. So far, I've only had to deal with security at airports trying to go against racial profiling and treat me like a terrorist because I'm the opposite of the profile of the terrorists they've found so far. So far, I haven't been arrested.
When I read this article I realized that "there but for fortune go I" and probably the best decision I made in my life was not to have children and that everything that has happened to me could still happen again but even worse. I realize that this case combines every issue that's wrong with this country and the whole world. I notice from the photo that MS Brown seems to be of African decent and I wonder if another reason I was luckier than she was is because I'm white, another issue being discussed often in the news lately.
Or maybe the government can't (shouldn't) take care of every single f^&king person every single f&*king day!!!!!!!!!!!!
We're going broke Nadine!
Wow, some of you people are heartless POS. I hope you all get a large dose of Karma right up the A$$.
How often do you volunteer at homeless shelters Jeff?
I have had DVT and PE twice - DVT was the FIRST thing they checked for when i walked into the ER in NYC with leg pain. Stupid, stupid, stupid Drs...
Yeah, stupid doctors who checked her for DVT with a Doppler Ultrasound, genius...
There is not enough information and very selective reporting in this article - !!
check out the linked article in the st. Louis Post - much less biased. MSNBC is the liberal equivalent of Fox News albeit less successful. Not surprising at all that they left out important details such as they fact that the woman was in fact appropriately evaluated with an ultrasound...
First of all we don't know all of the facts here. This woman seems like she wasn't stable mentally. For all we know she went into the hospital and had some sort of violent outburst which led to her arrest. Now her family is hiring a lawyer to sue someone? where were they when this woman was homeless and jobless? They obviously cut ties with her a long time ago, now they smell some money and they come running.
Get the facts - this woman wasn't stable. The emergency room isn't responsible. I'm sure they gave the best trwatment they could under the circumstances.
You mean, of course, the most profitable treatment.
This woman was probably suffering from PTSD after losing her home to the tornado. There is no mention if she had problems prior to that, but she had a home and a job before the tornado and tried to care for her children after she lost everything. She clearly more help than she was getting. Thought and prayers go out to her family. May they get the additional help and closure that they need also.
pretty sad family,the women is homeless yet as soon as shes dead the family gets the lawyers going,where were they before????
According to the article, her mom was raising her children after the state placed them there on the condition that the woman not be allowed to live with them. It sounds like the woman's mother was helping her as best she could by keeping her grandchildren out of foster care. She was not allowed, by the state, to help both her daughter and her grandchildren.
Health care is not an entitlement.
Dean,
We live in a world where our food is laced with chemicals, toxins are dumped into the water, & the very air we breath is poisoned. Why isn't health care an entitlement? It's absolutely necessary to preserve our right to life.
Or don't we have the right to live?
Examples: My mom-in-law is diagnosed with a panic attack & booted from the hospital. She's back that in the ER that evening with congestive heart failure (barely survived).
Another elderly in-law winds up at the ER suffering from "confusion". Diagnosed with Alzheimer's & sent home, she dies a few years later, & the autopsy shows she actually had micro-strokes.
A niece is taken to the ER with bleeding. Her fanciful tale of abuse by an uncle (no, not me sicko) is dismissed as childhood fantasy. He goes on to molest several more girls, including his own daughter.
That's just my own family. It would take days to discuss every case. And in every case, the victim had little or no insurance.
This kind of thing has to be expected when health care determinations are based on executive compensation & stockholder dividends instead of medical considerations. After all, you wouldn't want some poor chairman of the board to be forced to fly last year's model of private jet because he can't afford this year's, & a new yacht & his 7th mansion. Right?
Her family does not show up until she dies, where were they when she needed help.
see my post 673.1 above.
Eric,
We ALL play Dr in an emergency - while we wait and wait and wait . . . we watch "real" drs guess and guess and guess while rarely listening or engaging beyond VERY basic questioning. If it were not forsome nurses, patients would break down from the fear and anxiety caused by the cold. impatient, and rather bored manner of many emergency room (and waiting area) personnel. There are many factors, of course, to blame for the poor qualitiy of medical treatment received by the uninsured or simply uninteresting (I'm think of my own mother who once diagnosed as having Alzheimer's seemed not to have limbs, infections, etc to doctors or nurses in any hospital). Playing doctor in this economy, in this society of anger and frustration, is crucial for most of us. Ms. Brown did not have the instrument that so many of us still hold dear and forget to appreciate - thank God for Google . . . It usuallly explains in detail and, frankly, listens better
My prayers are with her family.
I think people need to be careful about assigning blame to anyone here. Even if this lady hadn't been in jail, she would have died in a shelter or on the street. I'm not sure what kind of "sophisticated" technology they used - probably a vascular study to rule out blood clots...it doesn't sound as though she was complaining of chest pain, shortness of breath or was tachycardic - there would be no reason for the doctors to go searching for a clot in the lung. If you practiced medicine that way you'd scan everyone who came through the doors from head to foot and run every lab test known to man on all of them. There is enough of that already - many providers order unnecessary tests so they won't be sued, "just in case," then insurance companies and Medicare/Medicaid won't pay for them because they aren't deemed necessary. People on here are blaming the hospital - next time you complain about your health insurance premiums or the cost of healthcare - think of all the defensive medicine doctors practice to avoid law suits and comments just like the ones you're making. You can't have it both ways people.
Lots of homeless people don't want to leave the ED - they don't have anywhere else to go. That's sad, but the hospital isn't a shelter. I also don't think people should blame her family - she was an adult - maybe she didn't want their help. I'm an ED nurse and we see people like this all the time. We give them a list of resources and discharge them. Otherwise, when your 85 year-old grandmother comes in with chest pain, we won't have a bed to put her in.
Welcome to Obamacare !!
Did the womans children have a father? If so where was he when HIS children needed help? Did this woman receive public money? If so did she spend it on kids are crack? People who won't take life serious enough to fend for themselves and their children then expect OTHERS who are responsible to take up their slack! NO WAY JOSE! The first person who should be questioned is the kids father! Why would a REAL MAN let the mother of his children suffer in such a manner??????? A REAL MAN wouldn't, but a whiny LOSER/PHONY would!!!!!!!!!
St. Mary's Health Center....hmmm....guess they missed the memo regarding WWJD.
My heart goes out to this woman and her family. Her struggles are over, not so those of her children. It is the American culture that killed this young mother. The culture of throw-away disposable everything, even people.
Her mental illness either started or was exacerbated by the serious financial downturns in her life. This is the classic tale of the homeless in our country. The kind of stress that comes from losing everything and having nowhere to turn can only be borne for so long before something breaks.
There are so many people involved in her decline, and yes, she did bear a small bit of responsibility herself, but a negligible amount and it is moot in light of her mental illness. There are several people/entities directly responsible for her death. Firstly the hospitals who would not treat her pain; the severe pain she had complained of for days and sought treatment for, only to be turned away or given a figurative band-aid. Then when the pain was excruciating and she became violent and abusive because of it, was she treated, was she even put into a psych ward for evaluation? No, she was arrested, dragged to and from the police car, dragged into a cell and left to die. At the very least, she should have been taken somewhere for a psych eval., oh wait, the hospital where she might have had that done had her arrested.
I sincerely hope a good and sincere attorney (are there any of those left?) steps forward to take this case. This woman's children should never want for anything the rest of their lives. There should be a trust fund and college funds and a nice home in a nice neighborhood to grow up in. They can never have their mother back, but her death may at least be the catalyst for raising them from the poverty and downward spiral they had fallen into.
The hospital and the PD need to step up and take responsibility. BTW, I want to see the security tapes.
Autopsy results before the blame game, please. Because technically-speaking, their both to blame.
It is interesting to note that this incident occurred at a "Catholic" hospital, really?
Yes this woman had been seemingly abandoned by anyone who truly ever cared for her and the "systems" failed her as well, so now it is time for all the usual parties to begin firing the usual rash generalizations, stereotypes and
slanders at one another. It really is just priceless anymore. In the end though, and as unfortunate as it has become, this is what us humans have become, the Haves, Have Wannabe's, and those who will never "Have" anything. The former two of these have become too caulis in general to care anymore and those who do care have been branded "socialists", "communists", "liberals", "the people that created these issues to begin with", bla bla bla and all the other "ism's" that have been coined by one side or the other to try and demean the other.
And watching the conformist religions just keeps getting better all the time as well. Oh don't get so upset ye Jesus crispies, it will all be ok when you stand in front of the pearly gates and you get your moment to try and rationalize
this morality you all have morphed into, "Do as I say, not as I do". By your own teaching’s umm... good luck with that and let us know how that worked out for you.
Read all the BS from page 1 comments and the article (which apparently many people didn't). This article reeks of the same filler that was in the toilet that CPS found. This is just another terroristic push by this media source to further Obama's socialist agenda. The only fact given are the ones that spin the truth to wrong doing.
Let's examine the real truth. The media uses a young black woman as the victim (what timing), she is homeless after a tornado destroyed her 1st home and was in another but didn't pay her bills after she lost her job, she hurt her ankle at some time previous to this hospital visit, she receives substandard treatment and is thrown in jail for trespassing and dies. This story has a familiar ring, maybe the Grasshopper and the Ant.
This woman had some issues that were truly sad, tornado and such, but she was receiving subsidy (as were many other impacted by the Midwest tornadoes). She had good ole government medicaid, food stamps and welfare, her trips to the medical facilities were probably via ambulance (at taxpayer expense), the house was probably being provided for nothing or next to nothing.
The questions:
WHO called CPS? Was it the grandparents and was that the only way they could get those children away from this unfit mother?
What did she blow her money on that she couldn't pay her bills and provide for children? Was drugs and alcohol?
Why wouldn't CPS allow her to stay with the children? Was it that CPS had dealt with her before or the grandparents ask for that condition because she was abusive?
Why didn't the family take her in? Was it that they had just given up trying to help her because she just abused the help when given?
Nobody want their child to die even if they are total waste and we certainly don't want to loose them to intentional abuse or neglect, I understand her parents concern there. I have a 29 yr. old that is that way and we cannot do anymore for him, we have rehabbed him several times alcohol and drugs and we must go on with our lives and raise the 3 children that he and his worthless women dropped in our laps, that's OK we love them and they being taken care of (no government help I might add).
this why the supreme court cannot strike down Obamacare. her only crime was no insurance and her color. if she was white and had insurance the hospital would have gave her a room for the night.
wrong! if she was a responsible adult with a job, she would of had insurance!!!!
MOST FOUL- I am not seeing how they acted accordingly, most breaks require surgery- for internal or external fixatures. Also, was her pain controlled? They were tasked to do no harm, you harmed her by allowing her to leave the hospital without managing her issues. They could have arrested her and gave her a room at the hospital with guards.... MOST FOUL!
Homeless, homosexual, straight, rich, poor, atheist. It does not matter. We are all human beings and deserve no less than the next person. Blood clots can be detected by a trained doctor and most ER doctors are trained in every field due to the numerous complaints seen in the ER. This was very bad medical care and this hospital/doctor should be held accountable. The police did nothing wrong, they were doing what the hospital staff relayed to them. This woman was in severe pain and she knew there was something wrong but due to no health insurance and no assorance of payment she was shoved aside and thrown in jail. Yea go Obama care. We all need treatment like this and that is what we would get under Obama's plan. My thoughts and prayers go out to this lady's family and her poor children. God bless them all.
Yes Cookie, the "We the People" government stopped slavery. That government no longer exists. The government that's here today isn't capable of fixing anything, as it's proven time and time again (USPS, DMV, Amtrak, IRS, DEQ, EPA, DOE, and the list goes on and on).
See, the government that ended slavery was you and me, not a bunch of Washington bureaucrats. The only people that can fix this country is US. We're not going to do it by passing more laws. We're not going to do it by creating more government entities. We're not going to do it by passing the responsibility off to others. We the People of the United States of America need to fix our country.
This is a prime example of the horrible nation that we've allowed ourselves to become. Where was Anna's family when she lost her house? When she lost her job? Where were all of those who are posting now about how wrong the police and doctors were? Some of you are quick to to demand that there be a redistribution of wealth yet are unwilling to offer charity at home, in your own communities, to your own families. We offer food stamps and welfare and medicaid and free cell phones and reduced lunches when we should be opening our hearts and our doors. Entitlement programs won't fix America, only Americans can do that.
And no, I am not for Obama care. Yes I am a Republican. Yes I do have health insurance. Yes I was a Republican before I had health insurance. Yes I spent 16 hours waiting to be seen in an ER at a charity hosptial when I didn't have health insurance. If you've never done this you ought to try it. If you belive that a government run health care system is the way to go you owe it to yourself to visit a charity hospital because this, best case scenario, is what will happen to our healthcare system. Yes, I agree, it is too expensive. Let's get the Federal Government out of the hospitals, out of the drug industry, out of the doctors' offices, out of the insurance companies. There is so much government regulation that the free market is dead. Allow capitalism to work. Go where you receive the best service and those that can't compete will fail (as long as we don't bail out those that fail). Let your money speak for you.
Don't have any money? Get the government out of our businesses so that corporations can offer decent wages and still be competitive in the world market. Before our government got out of control American corporations were able to offer retirement and health care to it's employees. They didn't do this because they were regulated, they did it because it was the right thing to do by their employees. They don't do it anymore because it is no longer financially feasible.
Apologies for rambling and I realize some of this is off point, I just had to get it out.
Not rambling-you're MAKING PERFECT SENSE!
We, as Americans need to take care of ourselves and quit expecting the government to do everything for us.
(double post)
If this women would have been treated, maybe even surgery, where would she go from there. Back out in the street. Yep, even free health care can't save the chronic dependents that want but never give back to society.
That's just the way it is. Both liberals and conservatives must face this issue.
The liberals are never going to face this issue because they're to busy crying about how badly they're treated, racism, discrimination,racial profiling,etc and it just goes on and on and on!
Blood clots do not discrminate, they do not care how old you are, you can get a clot at ANY AGE. It does not matter on age. Kids have died from blood clots from sitting too long playing video games. Has nothing to do with race. It is the insurance. Most insurance companies follow medicare guidelines. They send you home because they do not want to pay for an extra night at the hospital. Has nothing to do with race. It does have everything to do with money. A rich black woman will get treated the same as a rich white woman. They do not discriminate on race, but wealth. I have seen all races die equally from blood clots. Young and old.