Nurse gave man fatal opioid dose in Winnipeg hospital intentionally, lawsuit alleges

October 19, 2024 Canuck

A Winnipeg man is suing a hospital, health-care workers and the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, alleging that after he complained about his father’s care, hospital staff intentionally gave his father a fatal injection of an opioid.

A statement of claim filed with Manitoba Court of King’s Bench on Sept. 27, 2024, names the defendants as Seven Oaks General Hospital, a doctor and several nurses, as well as representatives of the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority.

On Dec. 4, 2018, the plaintiff’s father, 95, was prescribed 1 milligram of hydromorphone by a doctor named in the lawsuit. The suit alleges the man fell into a “deep sleep” following the injection and never woke up. He died on Dec. 9, 2018.

The plaintiff was the primary caretaker of his father and directly involved with his medical decisions, the statement of claim says. The plaintiff alleges he had communicated with hospital staff that he was to be informed of and consent to all medical decisions relating to his father.

The plaintiff did not consent to his father’s treatment with hydromorphone and was not informed of the treatment, the statement of claim says.

His father’s specialist doctors were also unaware of the treatment, the lawsuit claims.

The lawsuit claims the man was given the injection without medical reason and without proper records of the injection.

The lawsuit also alleges the hospital did not hand over the father’s medical records detailing the hydromorphone treatment when the plaintiff requested them.

Alleged threat

The plaintiff’s father was admitted to Seven Oaks Hospital on Nov. 29, 2018, for a scheduled procedure that was completed successfully, the lawsuit says, and stayed in the hospital to be monitored for a few days afterwards.

The statement of claim says on Nov. 29, 2018, the plaintiff went into his father’s room and found him “gasping for air” after his oxygen tube had dropped from his nose to the floor.

The plaintiff says he contacted the hospital’s nurse supervisor about his father’s quality of care. The nurse supervisor told the man his father’s nurse would be disciplined for failing to properly attach the oxygen tube, the claim says.

The lawsuit claims the nurse supervisor did not discipline the nurse, and the same nurse continued to care for the man’s father after the incident.

The plaintiff alleges the nurse “uttered a threat” toward the man and his father’s family for attempting to have her disciplined, saying she “would get” them.

Change in status

The statement of claim says the man’s father was not palliative, but his patient status was changed to “comfort care” at some point between his admission to hospital on Nov. 29, 2018, and the date of the injection, Dec. 4, 2018.

The suit says patient status was not discussed with nor agreed to by him or his father. The lawsuit claims the father’s specialist doctors also did not agree to this status change.

The lawsuit says Seven Oaks Hospital, hospital staff named in the lawsuit and the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority owed the man, as the primary caregiver for his father, informed consent to all medical decisions, and breached duty of care to discuss potential risks of treatment with the father as a patient and the man as primary caregiver.

A dollar amount for damages being sought is not given in the lawsuit.

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