October 4, 2010

Deb:

You can hate me as much as you want, you can try as hard as you like to shut me out of Linda's life, and you can let your anger at me get the best of you, but will never get me to stop loving her or trying to get her out of the terrible place you have left her alone in with no one to defend her against the awful doctors who keep hurting her. The fact you feel justified in abandoning her there for days at a time when it is NOT my fault they threw me out of there is completely illogical. They had already decided not to let me back in when they sent me away. My coming back to say goodbye to her and let her know I had not abandoned her had nothing to do with the outcome. The hospital had already decided to throw me out because I tried to expose their incompetence to the press.

They are the bad guys not me. And now you have chosen to be on their side and try to freeze me out of Linda's life. If they kill her it will be your fault for abandoning her to their whims and dismal treatment. They could have done a pleurodesis but waited so long to even think about it that now they say she is too sick to tolerate the procedure. And you let them get away with such awful medical care that you know is bad, when you are a trained nurse. Worse than that, you assist them in depriving Linda of the watchful eye of the only person in the world who ever cared enough about her and how she was being treated to spend 24 hours a day seven days a week in the room with her. You helped them justify throwing me out by making yourself available as a power of attorney when you knew you could not live up to the fiduciary obligations imposed by that position because you won't stay there with her to speak for when she can't speak, and you are just too afraid of her doctors to stand up to them and tell then NO when that is what Linda wants and what needs to be done.

You have screwed things up so badly your sister will probably not survive to ever leave that place, and you are going to let her die there without me or anyone else in the room to comfort her at the end because you won't stand up to their bullying and insist that they let me back in. Don't give me the load of crap Chuck has been trying to feed me about how well Linda is progressing. As long as she can't breathe on her own Tector will never let her go because he is on the Blue Cross gravy train and all he cares about is the money. Everyone at I U Hospital including the risk management people, the care managers and the lawyer is afraid to go against what Tector says because he is the billion dollar a year cash cow for that hospital. You know all of this is true, yet you continue to take their side against me. So be it.

You have earned my hatred, and you have it. You choose not to respond to my reasonable requests for information about how Linda is doing, because you are afraid of the hospital and what they have threatened you with, though they have no legal basis whatsoever for making such threats. You are useless to me and to Linda and once she recovers, if they don't kill her, she will realize that. Try with all your might to turn Linda against me and you may succeed, but it will not be good for her. Hate me all you like, you are in no position to care for her for the rest of her life with me out of the picture, but that's what you will have to do if you succeed in turning her against me as you are very clearly trying to do by cooperating with the hospital in its attempt to cut me off from all communication with her and about her.

I don't care what you may think of me. I don't care what anyone but Linda thinks of me. If I hear from her lips that she wants me out of her life, I will go. Otherwise, I will continue fighting for what I know is right whether it means you never get to see her again, Chuck never gets to see her again, or whatever other terrible consequences they threaten you with. Consequences are coming for those awful people, and soon. I have already initiated a criminal investigation into their interference with my get well cards mailed to Linda, which is a federal crime. If you are part of it and end up in jail because of that, tough.

I have initiated lawyer discipline proceedings against Michele Calderon Johns because she knows there are no guardianship court orders, no domestic violence court orders, and no criminal no contact court orders, and yet she continues to permit hospital supervisors to lie to nurses, other caregivers and visitors about the existence of such orders. I am right now in the process of studying about how to proceed with a disciplinary complaint against Dr. Tector's medical license for his failures in Linda's care and treatment, and his complicity in illegally interfering with my right to communicate with my wife. I will not rest until he is no longer permitted to practice medicine. I will go after all the other doctors who have hurt Linda as well.

I have already complained to the Joint Commission about I U Hospital's abuses in Linda's case and against me, and I will continue to add to that case as additional information comes to my attention, and sooner or later it will all come to my attention, whether you tell me about it or not. Lawsuits are the least of their worries now. I will not rest until I U Hospital loses its accreditation.

You will end up being a witness in many of these proceedings because you will be subpoenaed to testify. You will be a defendant in the court case regarding the validity of my health care power of attorney for Linda, especially if you continue refusing to provide me a copy of the "new" power the hospital keeps telling people Linda has signed excluding me. After all the other lies those people have told me and others about mythical court proceedings and orders of protection, I have no reason whatsoever to believe such a document exists until I see it with my own eyes. Besides, I know Linda signed it under duress, if she signed any such paper at all. The least you could do is fax a copy to me, if it is real, so we can peacefully go to court to determine it's validity. The truth will come out eventually, and you told Chuck at first there was no such document, so you lied about it to someone at some point in time.

If you think I am going to let any of this go without litigation, criminal investigation where warranted, and professional licensing discipline, you are dreaming. I will not stop until everyone who has participated in keeping me separate from Linda for such a long time is punished to the full extent possible. That means your nursing license is in peril as well. For you to sit by and watch those incompetent doctors and nurses continue hurting your sister when you are duty bound as her fiduciary to prevent that sort of thing is a liability you took on voluntarily, and for which you will pay dearly. The standard of conduct for you, as a nurse, is even higher than it would be for someone without training in the healing arts in a similar position. It will be my life's work from here on out to professionally destroy everyone who has had a part in this travesty, you included. Your refusal to even respond to my simple requests for information about my wife is intolerable and unforgivable. I have taken all I can of the isolation, bullying and intimidation you and the hospital have been dishing out. You will all pay, and pay dearly.

Now, even if Linda herself, who neither you or the hospital will even permit to call me on the phone, or me to call her, were to ask me to stop fighting this injustice, I would not stop. You and those around you at I U Hospital have had weeks and weeks to bully her into doing what you think she should be doing instead of what she wants done. I know, because that is what started all of this. She wanted to be let to die in peace, and you and the other right wing religious fanatics down there in the heart of the Bible Belt who kept telling me "Jesus doesn't want your wife to die" have done everything you can to browbeat her into continuing to suffer rather than letting her go peacefully as she made me promise long ago I would help her do when the time came and she chose hospice rather than all the torture you have put her through during the last several weeks. I heard you tell Linda and Pattie "I'm the witch in all this," and that is the last time I heard the truth pass your lips. I knew from the time Linda wanted to die at Northwestern and you didn't want to let her go that there would be a battle royal over this should the situation arise again, and it has and there is. You will have to kill me to get me to stop fighting you and everyone else on this.

I hope you are fully prepared. I am.

October 4, 2010

Well we have reached a new low point in relations with Indiana University Hospital. Now they are returning my get well cards to Linda marked “Undeliverable as addressed – Unable to forward”  despite the fact the envelopes have exactly the same address as on the dozens of cards I opened from all of you when I was in the same room with her that she is in now before they bodily threw me out. I am so angry I phoned the postal inspector and they have opened a criminal investigation in the matter. Interfering with delivery of the mail is a federal crime.

Also, since they have chosen to go down to this level, I am submitting an ethics complaint to the Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission against the hospital’s lawyer who still allows the supervisors there to tell nurses, respiratory therapists and visitors that there are court orders of guardianship regarding Linda and court orders of protection against me when in fact according to my review of the probate and criminal dockets in Marion County, there has never been such an order entered at any time. As for orders of protection, there are none against me anywhere in the State of Indiana. It is utterly unethical for a lawyer to misrepresent a court order’s existence or contents, and even if the original statements to nurses and visitors were the result of “miscommunication” or “misunderstanding” of some sort, the lawyer is ethically obliged to correct the misrepresentation by his or her client once it is brought to the lawyer’s attention, as I did in writing four times to the hospital attorney – copies attached as exhibits to my ethics complaint. Fight fire with fire, I say.

Linda has been back on the ventilator ever since the September 23 botched thoracotomy, and can’t talk for herself, so Deb is back in charge, and when I got the cards back and called to her to see if that meant Linda had been transferred, she never returned the call, though she did return the call from the Blue Cross case manager right away this afternoon. I had to call RML myself to find out Linda was not there, and then had to call Blue Cross to find out she is still at I U Hospital. Now I U Hospital tells Blue Cross there is a new health care power of attorney for Deb alone, but the hospital refused to sent it to Blue Cross, hence the call to Deb to get it from her. I believe they are lying about that too. But, if it exists, I have never seen it and couldn’t say whether or not it purports to revoke the one in my favor, so I don’t really know if Deb has exclusive power or not. Guess I’ll have to go to court here and seek guardianship of Linda. At least if there is a new document, that action will flush it out.

As soon as I have a couple grand I can spare for court filing fees I’m going to get appointed Linda’s guardian and then go to federal court in Indianapolis for a writ of habeas corpus. I’m through letting those bullies push me around just because they get away with this most of the time. They behave imperiously with total disregard for human decency, then they wonder why people come barging into their hospital with guns blazing. They have nothing to blame but their own chutzpah.

I will not be finished with my crusade until Tector has lost his medical license, Michele J. Calderon Johns has lost her law license, Indiana University Hospital has lost its accreditation, and the nurse supervisor who keeps telling lies about court orders of protection has lost her nursing license. And, if I can figure out how to do it, I’m going to get Deb’s nursing license taken away as well. She has no right to participate in this conspiracy on their side.

They all have fucked with the wrong fat old white guy this time!

September 30, 2010

Here’s the latest information I have on Linda, no thanks to Chuck or Debbie who refused to pass along the fact that the doctors at Indiana University Hospital have nearly killed my wife once again last week!

On September 23, 2010, Dr. Tector decided Linda needed a thoracotomy, due to the fact that her pleural effusions had consolidated and become so thick that they wound not drain through her chest tubes. On Monday, September 27, 2010, the surgeons discovered that Linda was bleeding into her lungs as a result of their surgery the preceding Wednesday, and they had to reopen her chest to stop the bleeding. As of yesterday, she was still on drugs to keep her blood pressure up because she lost so much blood as a result of the botched chest surgery.

Blue Cross/Blue Shield is cutting off Dr. Tector’s gravy train now, denying any further payment to IU Hospital after today since BC/BS has determined through its case manager for Linda’s care, that Linda would be much better off at RML, as we have been contending for many weeks now. She may be transferred there as soon as next week, since BC/BS and RML both have everything in place for the transfer except Dr. Tector’s discharge order, which he might sign now that he can’t get paid for holding Linda hostage any longer. Of course, Tector will say Linda isn’t stable enough to be transferred yet, and he will argue she needs to stay in Indianapolis longer under his care.

Just so BC/BS has all the ammunition they need to pressure Tector to let Linda go, I’m going to send her whole history to the case manager at BC/BS, because when I spoke to her she obviously was not aware of how abusive Tector and his crew have been towards Linda, and towards me. Maybe now those facts will have some weight.

Say a prayer for us!

September 22, 2010

Chuck:

I'm not "raging on the internet." I'm merely reporting the true facts about all the ways doctors and nurses at I U Hospital have hurt and continue to hurt my wife. I have not said a single thing in any of my e-mail to friends and family that was not the truth. If Debbie chooses to share these private messages with hospital staff then she is on their side, not on Linda's side or my side. Every one of my e-mails has a statement on the bottom that it is intended only for the individual recipients. Debbie's decision to share them with hospital personnel is an illegal violation of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, for which she will eventually have to answer.

The hospital's portrayal of me as a violent and abusive person is libelous and false and done for the express purpose of justifying their decision to cut off communication between us about her care and all the mistakes they continue to make, which are preventing her from getting better. I am confident Linda told them I have never been abusive towards her, and they know I have not. If they really thought I was they would have gone to court and obtained an order of protection, which they have never done and which they have no basis for doing and they know that. Everyone who knows and loves Linda depends on me to tell them how she is faring, since no one in my family, or among our friends, except you, Debbie and Richard, is allowed to call and get information about her, or to visit her - not even our kids. I U Hospital is only trying to protect the reputation of its transplant program and to keep the truth from coming out in public. They know I have reported their abuses to the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals. They know I have told newspaper and TV reporters about everything that is happening, and they are angry because they can't stop me from telling the truth. The only weapon they have is cutting off communication between me and Linda, and they don't care who gets hurt in the process.

Well, now they are shooting themselves in the foot, because their intransigence is going to cost Linda one of her two health insurance coverages, and they aren't going to get paid for their services any more. Maybe that will help then decide to let her go somewhere else. When it happens, they will have no one to blame but themselves. I can't help her with this issue if I can't communicate with her about it. Richard just brushes it off by telling me "Once Linda is off your COBRA, she will qualify for the new ICHIP program until she gets Medicare," like that's a good replacement for the double coverage she has from BC/BS now.

No one wants to take responsibility for helping Linda solve this issue, but nobody wants to let me help, either.

It's up to you whether you want to shut me out of Linda's life now. I can't stop you if that is your decision. Whether you tell me what is going or not, I will eventually find out in the court proceedings, and the world will know because everything in court is public. As for any conspiracy between us, I never meant to imply any such thing. I merely reported what you told me, and drew my own conclusions from the obvious facts. You and Debbie both insist Linda is getting better, yet after all these months she still can't breathe on her own, and no one will do anything to stop the pleural effusions. If they don't fix that soon, Linda will die, and everyone inside and outside IU Hospital knows it. Yet, they won't allow her to be transferred to the one place near here that specializes in just such problems.

I don't have enough information from Debbie, from you, or from anyone else to know whether Linda still loves me or not. No matter, because I still love her, and no one will ever stop me from doing everything I can within my power to help her get out of that awful place. It will be up to her to tell me, once that happens, whether or not she still wants me in her life.

I have never threatened anyone at I U Hospital with anything violent - I only told them they were going to get sued, and they knew that anyway. In fact, on more than one occasion Dr. Tector told me to go ahead and sue him. He pretended that it has never happened to him before, but a review of the state claims database in Indiana indicates he has been sued multiple times before he ever got involved with Linda, so he is no stranger to the process.

The people at that hospital are so full of shit when it comes to respecting what their own brochure says are patient rights, and they lie to their own employees about guardianship and orders of protection, that I don't trust any of them about a single thing. Then even wrote lies about me in their own hospital chart, before they threw me out of there. I pointed them out to Dr. Tector, and he acknowledged they were false, but refused to change the record and tried to blame it on the fact that the doctor who dictated the operative report, who was not even in the building when what he described was supposed to have happened, was dictating in a "second language." Horse manure!

They are cooking up all this garbage about me being violent and abusive just to discredit my testimony in the lawsuit they know is coming. They have nothing at all to back it up. They can't stand the fact that someone knowledgeable and intelligent is looking over their shoulder, and calling them out for their mistakes. It sickens me that they have pressured you into becoming an apologist for what you say is good care for Linda. The reason they have been so abusive to me is an attempt to intimidate me into silence as well. It won't work.

The only reason the hospital feels like people who tell me the truth about what is going on are "spies" is because they have so much about the inadequacies of their doctors and their program to hide from the world. They hate me because I know how to make them give up the truth. Dr. Tector tried to pretend he had never seen a code sheet until I showed him Linda's. Bullshit. He has had to sign off on a lot of other charts with code sheets in them long before this. What pissed him off was the fact I told the press about what happened to Linda, and a television medical beat reporter called him and asked him questions about it. Now the Joint Commission is asking him about it, too.

For Linda's sake and for the sake of all the other patients in the TICU there, somebody has to tell the world what goes on there every day. Feeding tubes clogged because the wrong formula is given to the patient. Happened to Linda three times in one day, and who knows how many more times after they kicked me out. Nurses screwing up the IV tubing connections so an entire bag of IV antibiotic runs out onto the hospital room floor before anyone notices the mistake. Happened to Linda two days in a row before they kicked me out, and who knows how many times more since then. Even if they don't write down these facts in the nursing notes, the pharmacy records will tell the story when you look at why an entire bag of medication was "wasted" and had to be replaced within half an hour of being dispensed.

Do they think I'm too stupid to figure this stuff out? NO. They know I can do it, and that's why they are afraid of me, not because they believe I am a violent person. The only thing they really are afraid of is that the world will find out the truth about the deficiencies of their transplant program.

Just so you know, I'm not sending this to Debbie or anyone else but you. I only sent you the e-mail about Linda's insurance in the hope you could motivate Debbie to get some help from the hospital social workers to solve this, since Richard shows no interest in doing anything to help other than shunting Linda off to ICHIP - one of the worst insurance programs in the whole country - and just letting her lose the double coverage she has now, so she will have deductibles and co-pays on all her care and all her prescriptions for the rest of her life. 

I can't do anything to help if no one will let me communicate with Linda. So, as I said in my e-mail, unless Debbie and Richard are going to resign their powers of attorney, the two of them bear the legal responsibility for fixing this in the very best way possible, or paying the financial losses Linda and I suffer for the rest of our lives as the result of their failure. I didn't put them in this position, they took on the responsibility voluntarily. However, I am completely serious about holding them to their fiduciary responsibilities to Linda under the circumstances. I will help if they will let me, but without communication to find out what Linda needs and wants I can do nothing. Or, they can both resign their powers of attorney and I will take back the responsibility myself, and then the hospital will have a legal obligation to deal directly with me whether they like it or not. And, I will enforce that obligation in court if I need to.

I'm only saying all of this to you because I expect you will tell both Debbie and Richard how serious I am about it, and then they will have to decide what to do soon, while there is still time left to take action before Linda's coverage runs out at the end of October. Once that happens, she will never get decent insurance coverage again for as long as she lives. I hope the two of them are up to the task. I know neither of them has been as willing to fight for what Linda needs as I have. I don't know about Richard, but I am reasonably certain Debbie has no errors and omissions insurance coverage which will protect her if she falls down on the job. Her precious state employee pension fund will end up paying for her sister's health care for the rest of Linda's life, or until the State of Illinois employee pension fund goes broke, whichever comes first. I won't be shy about pursuing her for every dime.

These are not threats, there are merely statements of fact concerning the responsibilities and obligations Richard and Debbie took on when they decided to butt in and take over.

The difference between your position and my position in all this is you are still allowed to see Linda, so the hospital still has leverage over you. There is nothing left they can take away from me except Linda's life, and they do seem pretty intent on doing that, too. So, I am free to spread the truth about what is happening to her, since she and I have nothing more to lose by doing that.

I really do mean to get moving as soon as tomorrow on this health insurance coverage problem, alone or with all the help I can muster. However, I'm not taking anyone's word about what Linda wants done in this regard except Linda's. If I can’t get that from her, those who are legally responsible for sorting out the situation will have to be left to their own devices, and to full responsibility for their acts, errors and omissions in that regard.

 I'm not sending this to Debbie, so no one at the hospital will see what I have said to you. However, please pass along to her and to Richard as much of this as you see fit, in an effort to help Linda get the insurance she desperately needs. Otherwise, we will lose our home, what little money we have left, Linda's and my future social security benefits, and everything either of us is likely to earn in the future while she lives. Be assured I will spend the rest of my life pursuing everyone responsible for the loss.

September 21, 2010

Jim:

     I did tell each of you all the information that either of you shared with me regarding Linda's condition each and every contact I had with her.  I understand that you need to fight for your wife in every way possible.  Why when you knew that all your e-mails were being shared with hospital personnel would you have made it seem that I was colluding with you to find fault with the doctors and nurses at the hospital.  I don't understand and almost cost me the privilege of getting to see Linda. I am one of the few people at this time who can give the time and has the resources to visit her.  Your last e-mail before the insurance issue made it seem like I was a spy trying to find out ways to lay blame on the hospital.  I don't understand why you felt the need to share all this information.  The tirades against the hospital didn't need to be shared with everyone.  You are viewed there as a dangerous possibly violent person who may do harm to the staff.  I don't care if you think this is ridiculous it is their perception and after the recent shooting of a surgeon, the patient and her son they had the police at the hospital.  Linda was questioned by the police regarding her safety and possible spousal abuse.  Don't quote me on this and then send it out to everyone.

            Deb was told it was apparent she was sharing information with someone and that that person was me. They were being reluctant to share anything even with Deb over the phone.  She feared that they would take guardianship of Linda and restrict her access as well.  If you think that I would jeopardize my chance to provide Linda with a little company to ease her isolation and encourage her just so you can rage on the internet then you don't know me very well. 

Chuck

September 21, 2010

Chuck:

It's clear to me now from your message that the only reason for the communication embargo on me is to keep me from finding out facts which continue to prove how badly the folks at I U Hospital continue to perform when it comes to Linda's care and treatment, and not because they think my talking to her would be bad for her health, or because she doesn't want to talk to me. She has never said to me, or even to you, that she doesn't want to talk to me.

I will eventually find out everything they have done to hurt her, and your refusing to tell me what is going on won't help them at all. You originally told both me and Debbie that you would not withhold anything from either of us, and you have apparently told her everything I said to you, to which I never have had any objection. Now, Linda is going to lose her health insurance forever because no one there at the hospital, and not Debbie, and now not you, will help facilitate communication with Linda about the problem. It IS a horrible mess, and would require a lot of cooperation to solve. However, I suppose when IU Hospital stops getting paid they will let Linda out.

I'm sorry you feel I misquoted you, or put you in the middle of my fight with IU Hospital. I never made it a secret from you or from them that I thought they nearly killed Linda on five different occasions before they threw me out. In fact, Dr. Tector himself admitted to me that those things should not have happened to her. Well, as you can see I have put everyone on notice today that if continuing to cut me out of communication with Linda causes her to lose health coverage for the rest of her life, it will be Richard, Debbie, IU Hospital Dr. Tector, Cindy DeBord and Michele Johns who are responsible for all the resulting financial losses. I can't help solve the problem like I would like to if no one will communicate with me.

I didn't create this nightmare, the hospital did when they lied to me to get me out of the building and then sent armed men out to tell me I could never go back to see Linda again. Despite all our differences, Tector and I were getting along fine right up until that moment. I don't understand why health care workers believe they should not be subject to being watched and reported on when they screw up. No one else has that kind of absolute right to control all the information about their job performance, and there's nothing godlike or particularly more worthy about doctors and nurses. They are human just like the rest of us and they ought to be able to acknowledge that they make mistakes and their mistakes hurt and kill people. But they aren't.

So, I'm sorry if this means we're not friends any more. I'm sorry of my letter made the hospital lean on you to cut off the flow of information, but I will still find a way to get to know what is going on with my wife, come Hell or high water. I won't be deterred or intimidated from asserting all of Linda's and my rights against them, no matter who is on the opposite side.

"Neutrality" does not consist of withholding information from one side while sharing it with the other side. I'm sorry to lose you, Tom and Donna as friends over this, but Linda and her situation is more important to me than anything else. You have told me on more than one occasion about doctors you spoke to who said Tector made mistakes, and I never once quoted you or them about such things, only about the FACTS regarding what has happened to Linda. I agree that some of the nurses and particularly the physical therapists take very good care of her. Yet, she still can't breathe on her own after several months of treatment, and the pleural effusions are not getting any better, and it IS their fault they didn't give Linda the definitive treatment for that condition when she was still strong enough to tolerate it. Debbie knows it, you know it and I know it, and THEY know it too. Even the people they talk to at Loyola and Northwestern know it, and now they refuse to have Linda as a patient because of it. Those are FACTS. And, they are not my fault in any way. So, I'm sorry you and Debbie feel everything is my fault. I tried to get the doctors to do as Linda wanted, even though it was not what I wanted or what Debbie wanted, and now Debbie hates me for it, but it was my legal obligation to try to get done what Linda wanted done. No one seems to understand that terrible obligation.

If you thought you could share information with me, and I wouldn't use it against Tector and IU, you really don't know me very well at all.

September 21, 2010

Jim:

     I have tried to keep you informed of Linda's health care and that she was alive and well.  You continue to quote me in your e-mails.  These e-mails have a blocked address until now so I could not dispute any of the statements you attribute to me.  The last message before this one misled people to think that I am providing you with information to continue your battle with I U Hospital, and Dr. Tector.  I have felt sorry for you being separated from Linda and tried to provide the minimum information to calm your fears that Linda was being mistreated.  I have always held a neutral position about the medical staff and found them to be attentive and while visiting her care has been exceptional.

     I am no longer willing to provide you with any other information except that Linda is alive and well.  During my visits I am only interested encouraging Linda to fight return to health.  Please do not use my name in any of your e-mails nor do I want you to quote me without my express permission. 

Thank you.

Chuck