Was Natasha Richardson's death preventable?

Natasha Richardson, 45, daughter of Vanessa Redgrave, died on Wednesday, March 18, 2009, at Lennox Hospital in New York after a ski accident on Tuesday, March 16, 80 miles from Montreal taking a skiing lesson on a bunny slope. She initially turned down medical treatment but an hour later complained of a severe headache and was taken by ambulance to a hospital.

Although she was only an hour ambulance ride away from Montreal, the worlds second largest French city, two days later she was taken to New York Lennox Hospital with emergency life saving surgery not having been done.

An autopsy of the actress Natasha Richardson on Thursday indicated that she died of a brain hemorrhage caused by “blunt impact” to her head, the chief medical examiner for New York City said. The official cause of death was an epidural hematoma.

Although she may have died in the United States if the accident would have happened, all the reports fail to recognize the deficiencies of Canadian Medicare that is available in nearly every city in America. Ms Richardson had her warning when the headache occurred one hour after the accident which normally alerts any physician to an impending catastrophic bleed requiring immediate burr holes in the scalp and possibly craniotomy. This was not done during the two days in Canada despite being within one hour via ambulance ride to hospitals in a world class French Canadian city

The news accounts focused on safety measures and helmets. These are excellent comments for the future of others. None seemed to be focused on what was really necessary to save her life after the accident. Perhaps no one wants to admit that we have the number one world class healthcare that half of the country thinks needs improving. However, they are talking about payment reform, not healthcare reform. Even though the World Medical Association rates America behind Columbia in care, we have never seen anyone flee American Care for that available in Columbia. The rating agencies never rate anyone without socialized medicine as having appropriate care. Hence, the falsely low standing of America noted in these prejudicial polls. (If you would flee from America for better care elsewhere, give us your story at the blog above.)

Universal availability of care saves more lives than universal access. American has universally available care. Canada has universal access to a waiting list. Care may never be rendered. In this case it was tragic.

Canadian Medicare does not give timely access to healthcare, it only gives access to a waiting list.

Comments

[Sarah]

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Sarah

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[Scott]

BS for this post and a typical scare tactic to socialized medicine, scary but of course 44 years ago over 50% of seniors over 65 had NO medical care and hand to depend on family or begging for help. Hence FDR with Truman by his side passed Medicare and for all intensive purposes IS socialized medicine. Less than 1% of seniors arent covered under medicare and remember its the MOST expensive patients to treat. Look at the facts of the case -
Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts is a town of 9,000 people. Its hospital doesn’t have specialized neurology or trauma services. It hasn’t been reported whether the hospital has a CT scanner; CT scanners are less common in Canada. Compounding the problem, Quebec has no helicopter services to trauma centers in Montreal. Richardson was transferred by ambulance to Hospital du Sacre-Coeur, a trauma center 50 miles away in Montreal—a further delay of over an hour.

Because she didn’t arrive at a facility capable of treatment (with the diagnosis perhaps still unknown) until six hours after the injury, in all likelihood by that time the pressure buildup was fatal.

If she was in some remote area in the states and refused care with no facility close by it would have been carbon copy outcome but lets base or completely broken system that has your insurance company making your life decisions on one case - classic republican mentality and completely flawed.