Inside sources within Asante have since disclosed details surrounding the reported deaths, per NBC5 News. It is alleged that up to 10 patients died of infections contracted at the hospital.

The sources claim the infections were caused by a nurse who purportedly substituted medication with tap water.

It is alleged that the nurse was attempting to conceal the misuse of the hospital’s pain medication supply — specifically fentanyl — and intensive care unit patients were injected with tap water, causing infections that resulted in fatalities.

Medford police have confirmed their active investigation into the situation at the hospital but have refrained from providing specific details.

The sources indicate that the unsterile tap water led to pseudomonas, a dangerous infection, especially for individuals in poor health, commonly found in a hospital’s ICU.

      • roguetrick@kbin.social
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        10 months ago

        I don’t know this hospital, but I generally grab several when I come on shift, put them in my pocket, and end up accidentally taking home a few often enough that I’d end up being able to have squirt gun fights with them.

        Essentially, nurses go through so many that you’d be hard pressed to control them. We use them for everything from checking the status of an IV line to cleaning a wound.

        • LanternEverywhere@kbin.social
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          10 months ago

          And even if they were inventoried (which they’re not) there still are always a zillion partially used bags littered everywhere, which in most cases are effectively still sterile.

    • tomkatt@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Presumably because the saline quantities were tracked and documented just like the fentanyl was. Tap water isn’t a medical supply. Still completely fucking heinous either way.

      • roguetrick@kbin.social
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        10 months ago

        No hospital would be able to run by being restrictive with flushes. You just need to use so many of them for IV management and drug administration alone, not to mention all the other stuff we use them for. Essentially every time you put something into an IV line, you need to flush it to get the medication to the patient and you need to periodically flush it to keep it patent. I will document them for Inputs/Outputs with someone who has a heart/kidney problem, but that’s as far as it goes. Billing wise, it’s subsumed under how they bill for “nursing” as an average, so it’s not tracked for that either.

        • PutangInaMo@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          Yeah I was in the hospital a few weeks ago and had an IV drip in both arms. They were constantly flushing both lines, didn’t seem like they tracked or cared how many got used.

      • AA5B@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        I do think tap water is worse. These are people with medical experience, a big part of whose job is making sure they use sterile stuff. They know better. There’s no excuse. This is not just accidental

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      10 months ago

      Are we questioning the intelligence of a person stealing vital medication from patients and swapping it for something else?

      • roguetrick@kbin.social
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        10 months ago

        I’m just amazed. It’s frankly easier to use a flush than fooling with a sink. You need a flush anyway to administer the medication and I’d imagine most folks diverting IV meds are smuggling them out after transferring them into an empty flush in the first place. It almost makes me wonder if who did it isn’t a nurse. Like a pharm tech doing a batch of them at a sink before loading the pixis.

    • FlowVoid@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Probably because they aren’t filling the containers at work, where they could be caught.

      Instead, they steal an empty container, take it home, fill it with water, bring it to work, swap it with a fentanyl container, take it home, use the fentanyl, fill the container with water, bring it to work, etc.

      • WhiteOakBayou@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        But even still why not use a flush to fill it. They are prefilled and everywhere. I’m a nurse and have worked with nurses caught diverting. This is extra fucked up. Put this guy under the jail.

    • Adalast@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Or even just distilled water. Buy a jug for a couple bucks at the supermarket or distill it yourself for a few pennies worth of electricity. The woman didn’t deserve her degree if she thought tap water was safe to inject.