A woman died after waiting for seven hours in a Nova Scotia emergency room, and her family is now blaming the country’s healthcare system for her death.
Canadian Health Minister Michelle Thompson wrote a statement on Monday, January 9 expressing her condolences to the patient’s family. She called the death a tragic loss and acknowledged that the family wanted answers.
A trip to the ER at the Cumberland Regional Healthcare Center in Nova Scotia, Canada turned into a nightmare for the Holthoff family.
Gunter Holthoff said that his wife, Allison Holthoff, 37, started feeling sick on New Year’s Eve morning, but she brushed it off as an upset stomach. As her condition continued to worsen, the couple decided to go to the hospital to get it checked out.
They arrived at around 11 am, and she was in so much pain that she couldn’t walk, so he carried her into the hospital on his back. Holthoff said his wife was in so much pain she could hardly sit in the wheelchair.
They completed triage at 11:20 am and waited for almost seven hours in the hospital waiting room and in an exam room waiting for the doctor, who did not see her until about 6 pm. By that time, it was too late for the 37-year-old woman.
Holthoff said that right after his wife was triaged, the nurses requested a urine sample, and when he took her to the bathroom, he couldn’t support her alone, and she fell. Two security guards had to help her off the floor.
When they returned to the waiting area, she could no longer sit because of the excruciating pain and positioned herself on the floor. As the pain worsened, her husband frantically told the nurses she needed to be treated, but nothing happened.
At some point, Allison told her husband that she was dying, and he insisted that the nurses do something. At around 3 pm, the nurses took them to a room that had no medical equipment. After a while, Allison started screaming, and a nurse came to check her blood pressure and found it was extremely low.
That is when hospital staff started to run around trying to care for her. By the time the doctor got to her, she was much worse, and it was not long before she took her last breath.
Holthoff blamed the healthcare system for his wife’s death, saying that the system was broken.
Allison was a mother of three children and the deputy chief of the Tidnish Bridge Fire Department.
After Allison’s death, Holthoff contacted Elizabeth Smith McCrossin, his local political representative. McCrossin wrote a letter to the Health Minister, Michelle Thompson, requesting an investigation into Allison’s nightmare experience.
Health Minister Thompson said that the government has started an investigation into Allison’s death.