The departmental fire and rescue service (SDIS) of the North and the Roubaix hospital were ordered on May 16 to pay 300,000 euros to a 40-year-old for having misdiagnosed him during a cerebrovascular accident (stroke) . The man is now quadriplegic.
On August 17, 2012, seized with dizziness, vomiting, balance and speech disorders, Christophe Blard called the firefighters and described his symptoms. Thinking of a heat stroke, the firefighter on duty at the end of the line advises him to go home and does not move. But on the way, Christophe Blard collapses. About two hours later, a passerby discovers him unconscious in the street and leads him to Victor-Provo hospital in Roubaix.
On the spot, the doctors waited two hours before deciding to send him to the CHR of Lille “taking into account the seriousness of his state of health”. Arrived on site at 3:30 in the morning, it is too late: Christophe already presents a “flaccid quadriplegia in the four limbs” following his stroke. A neurological examination diagnoses that he suffers from “locked in syndrom” or syndrome of confinement. If his intellectual faculties are intact, he is today quadriplegic and dependent. He is aware, hears and sees but can no longer speak.
“The operator who took the call did not take the necessary action”
After six years of proceedings, the Lille administrative court finally ordered the SDIS and the Roubaix hospital center to pay him 315,287.43 euros as well as 18,000 euros to his parents. Indeed, according to justice, the 3h30 delay in the care of the patient deprived him of “30% of chances of undergoing a less unfavorable neurological evolution and of keeping less serious after-effects of the cerebrovascular accident of which he was victim”.
“It is clear from the call that he is making to the firefighters that he is in a state of distress and in any event that the operator who took the call did not take the necessary action. service malfunction “, testified Blandine Lejeune, Christophe’s lawyer, at BFMTV. In its defense, the SDIS du Nord, affirms that the firefighter on duty who took the call answered the victim “in an appropriate manner given the large number of calls that day, his very limited medical skills and symptoms described by the person concerned which may suggest pathologies other than a cerebrovascular accident “.
The errors of the emergency services follow one another
This case is not unlike that of Naomi Musenga, who died at the end of December after having contacted the Samu of Strasbourg who had made fun of her on the phone. Five months later, revelations regarding the circumstances of his death sparked a massive media storm and led to the opening of several investigations. The Strasbourg prosecutor’s office has opened a preliminary investigation into the head of non-assistance to a person in danger and the parents of the victim have lodged a complaint to find out the exact causes of their daughter’s death. In parallel, an administrative investigation was opened by the university hospitals (Hus). The Minister of Health Agnès Buzyn must in particular meet the emergency doctors to take stock of the tragedy.
Since these revelations, testimonies relating to negligence are pouring into the media. Thursday, May 17, the prosecutor’s office of Saint-Etienne opened an investigation for “non-assistance to person in danger and manslaughter”, after the death of a 38-year-old woman, 6 months pregnant, not supported by the Samu nine days ago. Victim of discomfort on February 28, her husband called for help. The operator advises him to call SOS Médecin, which he does. But when the doctor intervenes two hours later, the mother is in cardiac distress. He then performs a cardiac massage and in turn calls the Samu. The young woman is placed in an artificial coma, but neither her baby nor she survives. The deputy public prosecutor of Saint-Etienne, André Merle, “referred the judicial police to a preliminary investigation”.
Samu refuses to move
At the beginning of February, in the middle of the night, a 3-year-old girl in great respiratory and neurological distress was brought by her mother to the Aix-les-Bains hospital. Contaminated by influenza, little Lissana could not be resuscitated. Her family said they called Samu when they saw the little girl’s condition deteriorate. But the emergency services reportedly refused to come, forcing the mother to take her daughter to the hospital herself. However, the girl was 3 years old and over 40 ° C with fever since Sunday, January 28, when the flu diagnosis was made by a doctor.
The persistence of the fever for 2 days and the gradual appearance of an increasing respiratory gene, very unusual in winter flu, should have alerted the doctors of the Samu, in particular with the history of bronchiolitis that the girl had. All the signs of severity of an unusual flu were present to trigger an intervention of the Samu and immediate hospitalization in pediatric intensive care.
Amputated after a late take-over of the emergency services
These dramas also recall that lived by Thomas Veyret (21), amputated after a late assumption of responsibility of the Samu in 2017. “It was the same odious speech and especially no empathy for the person, no consideration of his state”, is remembers the young man after hearing the recording of the call made by Naomi Musenga at the Samu.
At the time, Thomas performed figures on a trampoline at his workplace in Grenoble and fell badly. He then calls the Samu and explains to the operator that his leg is “square”, therefore fractured. The operator asks him to straighten it himself: “Wait, I’m going slowly because there …”, explains the young man. And his interlocutor replied: “Go slowly but now I have been waiting for a while”. This bad gesture and its late management prevent oxygenation of his leg for several hours.
As pointed out BFMTV, Thomas had to wait 7 hours before having the CT angiography, an examination making it possible to visualize the arteries and blood vessels responsible for supplying the body with oxygen. “The situation is common between the case which concerns my client and this young deceased woman, Naomi, namely that it is this lack of listening which causes the medical error”, declared Me Edouard Bourgin, the lawyer of the Veyret family.
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