Autopsy Results

Dear Jill,

I just published this to my mom’s website:

http://kathiegagne.com/2012/09/27/any-update/

I am just now realizing that I was told repeatedly by Dr. Wolf and by Attorney Phillips that Dr. Wolf would not be able to finalize my mother’s autopsy until and unless she received copies of my mother’s medical records from Woodland Terrace. To the best of my knowledge she was never given those records, and yet she did finalize the autopsy.

This discrepancy is troubling me very much. Does this mean that the autopsy Dr. Wolf provided should be considered incomplete and / or inconclusive?

All of the news lately about the 87-year old woman in Bakersfield, CA who died in a nursing home after the nurses and staff refused to perform CPR has also made me realize that — because I was in such a state of shock — I never thought to ask if anyone at Woodland Terrace made any attempts to help my mother.

Also note this post: http://kathiegagne.com/2012/08/12/evacuated-to-the-emergency-room/

I have always had questions about what happened between when exactly my mother was found “unresponsive” and when she arrived at the hospital. And I have always questioned why Nurse Alvis told me that she was not able to detail what happened during that time because — she told me — she was busy preparing paperwork and my mother’s chart to go to the hospital, yet everyone at the hospital who spoke with me stressed that they received no paperwork or information at all whatsoever with my mother.

Detective Whittier of the Deland Police Department had questions about all this, too, and seemed at first to be very engaged in determining what had happened. But after a week or two he simply completely stopped responding to my phone calls and I was never able to get in touch with him again.

Thank you sincerely,

David and Jennifer,

Unfortunately I think that most of these questions will not be answered fully until we get the records and see what is there and what isn’t. We should be able to tell when she became unresponsive and her true condition during admission to the hospital. We may be able to tell if Dr. Wolf got copies of the records to base her opinion or if she executed the autopsy without them. We just don’t know right now.

I know a lot of questions are arising as more time passes, but none of the answers will likely appear until we get the records. I know this doesn’t help much (if at all). I am sorry I can’t offer more answers at this point.

-Jill