LOOK OUT BELOW! - MEDICAL NEGLECT - Government - http://maxpages.com/darkevilworld/Look_Out

On July 8, 1999, Inmates Glenn Whitcam, #114109 and Billy Perry, #77277 reported for work on the construction crew along with their coworkers and supervisors. For at least the sixth time since I arrived in 1981 the entire Unit's roof has been stripped and re-tarred to seal against water seepage from rain and other inclement weather, all to the tune of about $250,000 a pop. However, despite the $1.5 million or more that has been spent on the roof in less than 20 years it has never stopped leaking, even though it seems to be a relatively simple thing to have accomplished given the fact that all the roofing is basically flat and level across all the main buildings on the compound.

At the edge of the two story Pod Units more than 20 feet high on the outside rims, the construction supervisors had jury-rigged some rails and pulleys from leftover scraps of junk, by which to raise and lower the roofing materials and equipment. Although many of the jury-rigged contraptions violate strict building and safety codes under both state and federal laws, the good ol' boys generally feel that they don't need to undercut their profit margins by buying a bunch of safety equipment for which nothing but a bunch of damned disposable prisoners have any need, anyway. Besides, when things go wrong the inmates can always be blamed and even if they dare to say something about it or file a legal action or complaint, no one will believe a word they say, especially once the appropriate paperwork has been taken care of and the stories of the staff involved have all been gotten straight.

One of the safety precautions that had apparently been determined to be "unnecessary" by the Maintenance Supervisor, Gene Bledsoe, a long-time good ol' boy in good standing, was a small and inexpensive safety clasp required by the Occupational Safety & Health Administration, (OSHA) when items are raised or lowered to any height from buildings or scaffolding. Instead, the welders had whacked out a homemade hook from some scrap rebar (slender metal rods used to reinforce concrete) and attached it to the end of a line for lowering and raising the buckets of hot tar and roofing materials to and from the roof. The hoist and lift extension required by OSHA likewise had been deemed by Bledsoe to be unnecessary at the Cummins Unit. The inmates could work with whatever he and his staff decided to let them have.

When Inmate Whitham had gotten everything in order to begin his long day of work, he noticed that one of the five-gallon tar buckets was half full of hardened tar and determined to lower it to the ground to have it reheated into a viscous liquid. He called down to Inmate Perry advising him that he was sending down the bucket, and then he attached it to the jury-rigged hook on the end of the line. Of course, the line was also not attached to the OSHA required hoist to allow the bucket to clear the edge of the roof.

As Inmate Whitham began to lower the several pounds of weight over the edge of the building, the bottom of the bucket caught on the tin lining at the edge of the roof, and the bucket tipped sideways. Since no clasp was there to keep the handle of the tar bucket from sliding off the hook, the bucket full of hardened tar came loose and tumbled some 20 feet to strike Inmate Perry directly on top of the head. It severely lacerated his scalp and knocked him unconscious.

When Perry regained consciousness some few minutes later, one of the decent correctional officers, Mrs. Tammy Banks, was trying desperately to get the Infirmary staff to respond to the emergency. When after some time no one had come, Mrs. Banks carried and assisted Perry to the Infirmary as best she could by herself. He was fading in and out of consciousness during the entire episode.

The fact that there had been no response team from the Infirmary is of no particular surprise. I can't recount the number of times in emergency situations when there was NO response, in largest part because the typical Infirmary worker is so seriously out of shape that they could not possibly endure the physically exerting and adrenaline-rushing nature of an incident like that. In fact, on several occasions in recent years, I myself have had to assist a nurse or other worker with getting their own breath back and getting back on their wobbly feet because they were so physically exhausted from trying to run an emergency stretcher to one of the buildings that they simply ran out of gas.

So, at countless times when other inmates have picked up the injured fellow prisoner, placed him onto the gurney and run him back to the Infirmary, it was then necessary to help the medical "team" get back there as well. Never mind the many unbelievable instances where a nurse weighing less than 100 pounds would be required to life a 250 or 300 pound man having a seizure or heart attack onto a stretcher. Apparently, however, the medical provider, Correctional Medical Services, (CMS), does not feel any obligation to implement a staff capable of giving emergency response.

The typical excuse given at times when someone is compelled to explain why no emergency response was given is that the medical staff was busy with some other calamity or was indisposed in the restroom or some place and could not respond. It is all insane. If it was not so tragic and criminal, it would be amusing to cross-reference the excuses given and determine just how many nurses and staff were in one tiny bathroom at the same apparent time!

After Inmate Perry was given over to the Infirmary staff by Mrs. Banks, he was taken to the "Treatment Room", thrown on a bed and left to lay there for almost four hours. No nurses treated his severely bleeding laceration, and no one bothered to examine him or even so much as take his vital signs.

The reason for this incomprehensible neglect is that the nurses and staff at the Infirmary are apparently under orders by CMS, or by the twisted beast and Infirmary Manager "Doctor" Michael Young, that they are NOT PERMITTED to administer even emergency aid without his explicit oversight or participation. This guy is one sick biddy - because it is HE who by the Arkansas Medical Board has twice had his license suspended in the past two years; it is he who is forbidden by the Medical Board to practice medicine without peer supervision; it is he who is required by that same Board to undergo psychiatric therapy for abusing patients and being responsible for acts of malpractice; and it is he who is forbidden to make serious medical decisions without peer review. And yet, despite these facts he was given authority over all the Cummins Unit Infirmary staff.

Although Inmate Perry was first injured shortly after 7:20 a.m., he was left lying in his own blood in the Treatment Room until well after 11:30 a.m. The nurses wanted to do something, they said, but were told not to until the good "Doctor" Young arrived. They wanted to send Inmate Perry to a local hospital because there was a potential brain or spinal injury and they did not have the equipment that might be necessary to make that determination or to rule it out - but "Doctor" Young told them to do nothing until he got there.

Of course, since "Doctor" Young was off on important business elsewhere, he took his good time getting back to Cummins Unit. He arrived some time before 12:00 p.m. Then, despite the fact that a trained x-ray technician had been there the entire time, she had not been allowed to x-ray Inmate Perry - and was not allowed to do the x-rays once "Doctor" Young arrived. He insisted upon doing them himself. Perry's fifth vertebrae was swelled to almost softball size.

After "Doctor" Young finished taking a flurry of x-rays, he left Perry laying untreated on the x- ray table for a few more hours. After all, Young needed to wait for the film to be developed and then expertly "study" the results for a while before making his diagnosis and prognosis. He concluded that nothing was wrong and that Perry was mostly faking it in an apparent effort to get out of work.

While Perry lay on the x-ray table, lapsing in and out of consciousness a few more times, neither Young nor any of the medical staff had bothered still yet to take vital signs or even to treat the lacerations to Perry's head. Fortunately, after several hours of remaining unattended the gash in his head had clotted and stopped bleeding all of itself.

Finally, at some time after 3:00 p.m., the remarkable "Doctor" Young determined to have CMS spend a few dollars of the annual budget to have Inmate Perry transported to a nearby Dumas hospital for examination and treatment. Perhaps he had overheard some of the disgruntled and potentially dangerous conversations among the nurses who were upset over the way Young was so casually handling the matter. Oh, but Inmate Perry's ordeal was not over yet.

After he finally arrived at Dumas hospital, there was no doctor there as well. So, Perry had to lay there and wait another couple of hours before that doctor finally showed up, took more x-rays, and finally gave Perry something for the severe pain he was obviously experiencing based on his vital signs.

Some 11 hours after he was first injured, the Dumas medical team finally determined that the laceration in Perry's head required stitches. However, having regained some of his faculties by then, Perry informed the staff that now that his laceration had coagulated and formed a scab, he was not letting them re-open it just to turn around and sew it up. He was returned to the Cummins Unit post-haste.

Inmate Perry is doing well today, no thanks to you, dear Citizen.

This regimen of professional medical treatment cost the taxpayers of Arkansas well over $1,000. Given the quality of it, I wish it were in my power to grant unto CMS and the Dumas hospital quadruple the amount. I think that it would be an appropriate way for The People of Arkansas to show their appreciation for this exemplary treatment, don't you think?

However, satire aside, the real tragedy is that now that money has been spent on Perry, some other poor chump who gets hurt is going to have to settle for some aspirin or Tylenol when he gets injured, because the kind of budgetary excess occasioned by Perry's carelessness will not be tolerated by CMS very often.

Across these years of criminal medical neglect and abuse, many nurses and other medical provider employees have expressed sorrow and frustration over what they have witnessed within the ADC Infirmaries. Almost without fail they have repeatedly stated, "I wanted to do something to help you, but my hands were tied. You understand? I don't make the rules, and even though they are wrong, well...there's just nothing I could do."

Although I do somewhat understand and sympathize with these nurses and medical personnel - most of whom are basically decent - NO, SIR!, and NO, ma'm! In THIS article you will not be permitted to escape so easily. It is because of YOUR attitudes, YOUR lack of courage, and YOUR self-centered concerns with keeping your jobs at all costs that these kinds of things exist in the first place. CMS, "Doctor" Young and everything and everyone like them are only a symptom of this thing that is wrong in YOU! It is YOU who allow the "Doctor" Youngs of this world to do what they do, because YOU blindly follow orders that violate every oath and ideal of YOUR professions, and YOU allow human beings to be mistreated, abused, neglected and needlessly die because YOU don't have the courage to stand up to a sickness like CMS. No, you are not yourselves the victims of an evil medical care provider - YOU are the very soil from which the victimizers spring and take life.

May you hereafter have the courage, the decency and the professionalism to do what is right.

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LINDA TANT MILLER

WASHINGTON

USA

tantsy1@msn.com

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Page Updated Thu Jan 24, 2008 6:54am EST