California,
Hey. My Fiance's father attempted suicide in August of this year via some methodone. His wife found him gasping for breath and called the ambulance, and they put him in the hospital for four or five days. He told several people prior to the suicide attempt that he wanted his chronic back pain to just "go away", and told his shrink that he had guns in the house and was very depressed. Upon hearing this news his shrink upped his anti-depressant pills.
Anyways, he survived the methodone suicide attempt and less than a few days after being released commited suicide by shooting himself in the head. He was a kaiser patient, so I know that you can't "sue" them per se, and that they won't admit any guilt, but were they in the wrong in this situation?
They didn't do a psychiatric evaluation on him before releasing him from the hospital, even considering the knowledge that he was suicidal and had weapons in the house. From talking with other lawyers about the case, they suggested that we might have "something" but that Kaiser is extraordinarily hard to sue, and that arbitration would be a long and expensive process. They also said that we'd need to prove that Kaiser was negligent in their care, and that if they had intervened he would still be alive.
So what do you guys think? Do we have a case?
An interesting side note is that for the first attempt, his wife, my fiance' and I were at the home when we got a call from Kaiser telling us he was Code Blue (heart failure) and that we needed to get to the ER ASAP. We drove there as fast as we could, and upon arrival were informed by a giggling nurse that they had accidentally called the wrong family and that he was fine.
Hey. My Fiance's father attempted suicide in August of this year via some methodone. His wife found him gasping for breath and called the ambulance, and they put him in the hospital for four or five days. He told several people prior to the suicide attempt that he wanted his chronic back pain to just "go away", and told his shrink that he had guns in the house and was very depressed. Upon hearing this news his shrink upped his anti-depressant pills.
Anyways, he survived the methodone suicide attempt and less than a few days after being released commited suicide by shooting himself in the head. He was a kaiser patient, so I know that you can't "sue" them per se, and that they won't admit any guilt, but were they in the wrong in this situation?
They didn't do a psychiatric evaluation on him before releasing him from the hospital, even considering the knowledge that he was suicidal and had weapons in the house. From talking with other lawyers about the case, they suggested that we might have "something" but that Kaiser is extraordinarily hard to sue, and that arbitration would be a long and expensive process. They also said that we'd need to prove that Kaiser was negligent in their care, and that if they had intervened he would still be alive.
So what do you guys think? Do we have a case?
An interesting side note is that for the first attempt, his wife, my fiance' and I were at the home when we got a call from Kaiser telling us he was Code Blue (heart failure) and that we needed to get to the ER ASAP. We drove there as fast as we could, and upon arrival were informed by a giggling nurse that they had accidentally called the wrong family and that he was fine.