Dennis Quaid Medical Screwup: How It Happened (his newborn twins given 2000X normal amount of drug)

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Quaid Medical Screwup -- How It Happened

Posted Nov 21st 2007 1:13PM by TMZ Staff

http://www.tmz.com/2007/11/21/quaid-medical-screwup-how-it-happened/



Sources tell TMZ that a pharmacy technician at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center mistakenly stocked a massive dose of a drug that ended up being given to Dennis Quaid's newborn twins. Thomas Boone and Zoe Grace are in stable condition. But a well-placed source at Cedars tells us they are "still very concerned because of the bleed out," adding they won't know for another week if the mistake will cause "longterm effects."

Sources tell TMZ that pharmacy technicians stock the drug Heparin, used to prevent clots and flush out IVs. The drug comes in vials -- 10 units for babies, up to 10,000 units for adults. Protocol at the hospital is to keep the different units separated, but a technician accidentally put 10,000 units in the drawer where the 10 units were stored.

Last Sunday, both infants -- born November 8 by surrogate -- were each given two, 10,000-unit dosages. They began to bleed out just before midnight and were transferred to the neo-natal intensive care unit.

Cedars issued a statement last night, acknowledging the mistake and calling it a "preventable error." That's highly unusual. Also, the hospital claims seven patients were given the wrong dosages. Our sources say 13 patients got the wrong dosage.

[Mojorabbit]

1. As a retired nurse

you ever give anything without doublechecking the dose. I am amazed this happened. I can see one mistake being made but not so many.

[SidDithers]

2. That's freakin' awful...

hope the kiddies are OK.

Sid

[TheMadMonk]

3. The orriginal error might just have been understandable.

But there is a far fucking larger one that is essentially going unmentioned.

There is at least (and probably several people) in that pharmacy who are not even performing the most basic of checks. ie comparing the dosage on the bottle and the dosage requested on the script.

An even worse possibility is that the "technicians" are as well trained as supermarket box boys.

Then there are the persons who administered the wrong dosage 7-13 times.

From the beginning to the end of chain not one person did basic checks that at least some of them are mandated to do. Not just once but multiple times.

[OzarkDem]

5. Ohio is trying to license pharmacy techs

require they have adequate training, etc.

Isn't there some way also to standardize labeling for pharmaceuticals?

[TheMadMonk]

8. Standardised prepacked doses is how this happened i suspect.

The wrong thing was in the wrong place and that was dispensed, rather than what was supposed to be in that place.

[madeline_con]

9. Hear Hear!

Those poor litte babies! I hope they're o.k.

[Lorien]

10. At Cedars-Sinai, no less

one of the top medical facilities on the West coast. That doesn't bode well for the rest of America.

[TheMadMonk]

17. I'd say it speaks volumes FOR/OF the rest of America.

Not my problem times two or three, culminated by, it must be O.K. or someone else would have noticed/done something.

This sort of attitude permeates the whole nation. "Not my problem. WTF should I put myself out?" "I got mine." "Not my job." "Eff U charlie." "What's in it for me?" "I'll have it now."


And on "our side" mostly a lot of whining, "Well what can we do? They keep breaking the rules."

Well enforcing the bloody rules would be a good start.

And extremism within the letter of the law, is not a sin unless is it is used to pervert the spirit of the law.


Unfortunately I don't think it's overly restrictive morality that is keeping "the good guys"/"our guys" ineffectually on the defensive.

Blackmail/extortion/intimidation could account for a part of the Democratic Party's reluctance to do anything effectual towards bring Bush and the cabal surrounding him to heel. But not all of it. Not by a bloody long shot. With that many "victims" being threatened there would have to be leaks. We'd hear at least some rumours. Someone would overhear (or be told) something and pass it on down the grapevine. And something would hit the media with a splash to rival Chicxulub.

But then again, can our own guys really be so squeaky clean that in a decade and a half, (Clinton + Bush 2) the worst that can be actually pinned on any "Stinkin' Durty Librul" is an illicit blowjob and a soggy cigar? Virtually all attacks against Democratics have been smear, innuendo, fabrications, anything but real "hurting" truth. Could it be the "real dirt" is being withheld for a killer blow meant to desroy the party? Is fear of minor (relatively) embarrassment now, keeping US quiet about our own "Uncle Chesters" and thus storing up ammunition for the enemy to turn against progressives at a time which will best suit them?

Triple think time. Perhaps we are that clean. Surely someone somewhere would have been venal enough to seek personal gain from revealing something. Or alternately, attempted to seek stake a claim in a very empty moral high ground by being "twice as ruthless" against their own.

So for the sake of argument, there CAN BE no substantial, truly damaging dirt to be had on "our guys", or at least not dirt that is not at least as hurtful to "their guys", which pretty much leaves a far more worrying conclusion. "Our guys" are not making a huge stink where it matters (in real legislation) beaucse they figure: "What goes around, comes around." Which takes us right back to: Eff u Charlie. I got (gonna get) mine.

America pretty much all over. DU can muster barely 100,000 members, (and how many of those are working for the other side?)

It really doesn't matter that people who would otherwise be horrified by what's going on are being deliberately kept in the dark by a complicit media. Those people don't care enough to inform themselves. The truth IS NOT hard to come by with only s minimum of effort. But it is far easier (and more comfortable) to coast along in a slowly shrinking bubble of comfort, perhaps bitching about this and that, but making no effort to know why "this and that" are happening at all.

Finally, when the country is falling down around their ears, are the people beginning to take notice. But still they fail to notice that their best "champions" are tarred with exactly the same brush as their worst enemies. Their real champions, they know not at all, because again they refuse to make the effort to find out for themselves. Instead they bite their tongues and make their choice only amongst the crop of piss poor candidates that the media deigns to recognise. The candidates who's only saving grace is that they're not quite as bad as the other guy when it comes to screwing the defenseless whilst buffing the buttocks of the powerful.

The Republican Party did not triumph through superior tactics. It triumphed through capitalising on and encouraging the basic traits of greed and venality.

The Democratics are failing because far too many of them are greedily and venally waiting for their own chance at those lovely expanded powers of the executive. Impeachment proceedings could be over and done with in a matter of days, if the party only had America's best interest at heart. There is enough shit on the criminal cabal in the Executive that if it was really brought out into the view of the public, that Republicans holding seats would be committing political suicide if they didn't condemn it in no uncertain terms. But impeachment would also mean undoing a huge amount of what has been done, simply by bringing it unequivocally into the light of day.

[mtnester]

18. I had surgery in August, and had a red armband with my allergies

darvon, codeine, percodan (and their offspring, darvocet, percocet, tylenlol 3, etc)

When being discharged, I was given a script for percodan...I looked at it, looked at the nurse who had just given it to me, and then held up my right arm with the red armband. I asked if the hospital pharmacy had those listed...he typed on that mobile patient computer and said no, they did not. He went out and came back in a bit later with the script for 600 mg Ibuprofen instead (requested by me...I knew all I would need is a strong dose of it for a day or two). NEEDLESS to say, thank God I was awake and alert and able to make that decision, and went home with nothing as I felt I would be OK with the Ibuprofen (I dislike taking script medicine unless I really need to).

Now, for those of you who wonder if I am allergic to all pain medications? No. I found out that I can take Diladid and Morphine just fine (scary what a diladid/morphine post op IV dump cocktail feels like...I was given both of these for the first time ever in my 47 year life...my hubby says I was completely stupid and out of it...I remember little except the first rush of the drug, which actually made me comment outloud..I thinks I said something like Shit, what was that?..Wow)

[ORDagnabbit]

4. maybe dennis should watch sicko now that he has a taste of what normal people have to deal with.

[DesertRat]

6. How horrible

I hope the babies do well with no lasting ill effects.

[kas125]

7. This should not have happened!

The exact same thing happened at a hospital in Indianapolis. Babies DIED!! The makers of the drug were supposed to change the packaging so adult doses and infant doses could not be mixed up again. I saw the vial on the news today and it didn't look as if anything had changed.

[SoCalDem]

11. Does the surrogacy issue have ANYTHING to do with the "issue"??

Nope..

I hate it when articles say stuff like "adopted" daughter/son or in vitro baby or surrogacy baby..

They are BABIES..it does not matter HOW they arrived..

No wonder DQ was asking for privacy.. T M I, TMZ..and MYOB :grr:

[SariesNightly]

12. Suits

If there's serious permanent brain damage to the twins, is a suit at all possible, or did Bushco did something to outlaw malpractice suits some time ago?

[Horse with no Name]

13. Even if he did

it wouldn't apply to children.
There isn't any way to actuate how much a child can earn in his adult life.

[Eric J in MN]

16. Juries give medical malpractice awards in cases involving children.

There is no way to know how much a child's lifetime earnings would be, but juries accept an estimate anyway.

[Eric J in MN]

15. There isn't a federal cap on malpractice awards, and...

...I don't think California has a cap, either.

Some states have caps.

My position is that we should have limits on pain-and-suffering awards the day that there are limits on pain-and-suffering itself (never).

[Horse with no Name]

14. This exact error happened a year ago

and I cannot understand how it could happen again.
One of the worst things that can happen in an infant that age is a bleed.
Ultimately, it is the responsibility of whoever gave the medication--not who stocked it.
Shame on them for being sloppy in their responsibility.
http://wwwimage.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/09/23/ap/health/mainD8KA8UD00.shtml
>>>snip
(AP) Early last Saturday, nurses at an Indianapolis hospital went to the drug cabinet in the newborn intensive care unit to get blood-thinner for several premature babies.

The nurses didn't realize a pharmacy technician had mistakenly stocked the cabinet with vials containing a dose 1,000 times stronger than what the babies were supposed to receive. And they apparently didn't notice that the label said "heparin," not "hep-lock," and that it was dark blue instead of baby blue.

Those mistakes led to the deaths of three infants. Three others also suffered overdoses but survived.