Friday, April 11, 2008

Blackburn grandmother refused operation

The Blackburn Citizen posted an article on a local woman being denied surgery because of her weight. Apparently the doctors felt it was less of a "health risk" to send her home to live on high levels of daily morphine doses than to figure out the correct anaesthesia for a woman who weighed a whole 238 pounds. Oddly enough, the doctors who gave her a hernia operation two years ago didn't think she was too fat to operate on at 280 pounds. In fact, the same hospital didn't have a problem 9 months ago when her original surgery date was only bumped when they discovered she was anaemic. Now she's suddenly "too fat" by the opinion of one doctor, and being tossed out of the hospital to get by as she can at home. Apparently now that there's an "epidemic" on, doctors have to save all the medicine for the thin people. In the meantime, the hospital chose to discharge the woman without explaining exactly how she was expected to lose 3 stone (42 pounds) while in constant pain from kidney nodules and cervical cysts, plus suffering from asthma.
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3 comments:

  1. vesta44April 11, 2008 at 9:09 AM

    I read that article this morning and the thing that pisses me off the most is that if she was going in for WLS, her weight wouldn't even be an issue. They'd be lining up to do surgery on her, but since she's fat and it isn't WLS she needs, to hell with her health because she's fat and it's all her fault, she just needs to stop stuffing her face and get thin, then she'll deserve surgery to fix what's wrong. Asshats, all of them.

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  2. GingerApril 14, 2008 at 10:05 AM

    What a crock of shit - aren't doctors supposed to do what they can regardless? I guess if she were thin and had no insurance, they would help, huh?

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  3. AnonymousApril 28, 2008 at 11:05 AM

    "First, do no harm." Refusal of treatment is harm.

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All comments may be moderated. If you think you're entitled to free speech, you are, on your own blog. This is my blog. I have opinions that are often subjective, and as I'm not running a documentary or research organization, there's nothing wrong with a little subjectivity. I also have the right to not approve or delete comments I find mean-spirited, idiotic or encouraging what I consider objectional, dangerous, or plain stupid practices (such as weight loss or cosmetic surgery, changing your body to please others (i.e. "dieting"), spreading hate, etc.). If you voice disagreement with anything I say, and you do it in an intelligent matter with clear research citations to your claims and conclusions (popular media articles don't count) I will probably allow the comment. I will also probably debate you and try to refute your claims. If at any time that devolves into stupidity or attack, I will start deleting your comments. If you disagree with what I say by spouting pseudoscientific popular opinion, displaying prejudice or hate, or otherwise acting like an ass-hat, I will delete your comment. That's pretty much the policy, subject to change without notice :-)