Gladys L. Reaves

The sweet looking lady pictured here with my partner is mama. Her name is Gladys L. Reaves. This picture was taken Thanksgiving 2011 at her apartment in Columbus Ohio. My sister lived there too. We had a nice time together, but little did we know it would be our last Thanksgiving with her. Gladys was a kind and gentle lady, always looking out for someone else, often putting her own needs aside. She would give her last dime.

From December of 2011 to January of 2012, mama had some blood clotting issues that had been quite manageable until a clot was discovered in her left thigh, lodged in the femoral artery (groin). In late January she was rushed into surgery to have it removed. (Sepsis and Surgery) She responded well to surgery and was soon released. She was told to expect the wound to leak, but as the weeks progressed, the wound leaked profusely.

Three weeks after surgery, mama was getting weak and she developed a fever that went up and down sporadically. By early March her weakness had worsened. She had a rapid heart beat, low body temperature and she couldn’t urinate. My sister took her to the hospital emergency and they admitted her. Mama was given fluids, evaluated for a few days, and then released. My sister wondered if she was released too soon because she was still considerably weak. The doctor said her kidneys were functioning better, but there was some fluid build-up in her lungs. On faith, my sister took her home.

Three days later, mama had become so weak that my sister called an ambulance. This was obviously now a real emergency. Her blood sugar had dropped so low that she had to be taken to the closest hospital, not the one where the surgery was done. Mama was admitted above all other patients as a septic alert and was immediately given large amounts of fluid and broad spectrum antibiotics. This was the scariest time of our lives.

Mama’s kidneys and liver begun to fail, but her heart, lungs and bowels remained fine. A week later she was intubated. A large abscess was discovered at the surgical site and identified as a possible source of infection. After an ultrasound revealed that the abscess was not interfering with major vessels, an incision was made in it to drain. We wondered if anything else could’ve been done and tried to get information, but none was given. In addition, a bedsore was found on her tailbone and we had to remind them daily to take care of it.

Mama was started on dialysis treatment and her kidneys responded so well that she was taken off of it after only a few treatments. We took that as a sign of hope, but what concerned us is that they let the abscess continuously drain with no discussion of it further. Within a matter of days the abscess became a deep, open wound, spreading down her thigh. It started to look like flesh was eaten away. Her bedsore was worsening too, becoming unstageable. At this point we were getting scared and growing unhappy with the hospital. There were several doctors involved and we couldn’t get any of them to speak with us, not until they called a meeting with us to end her treatment. My sister and I would not do it. Mama was still alert and very responsive to us. She was showing some slight signs of improvement, but we still felt not everything was being done for her, we just didn’t know what.

After two months in the critical care unit, my sister and I became desperate to the point of panic. We hired a private ambulance and checked mama out of the hospital. We took her back to the hospital emergency where she originally had the surgery.

It was an effort made too late. Mama died that evening, May 9, 2012 at 10:22pm.

At her passing, a great portion of her leg was eaten away. Flesh and muscle were exposed and her tailbone was eaten away. As of this writing we have contacted more than 50 attorneys. All of them declined to help us. Some didn’t even have the professionalism to return our calls. Their consensus seems to be: “We can’t prove she got the infection in the hospital”. After months of tireless research, mama’s final autopsy and medical records, she died of the most common nosocomial infections: VRE (Vancomycin resistant enterococcus), urinary tract infection, klebsiella and pseudomonas. We may never get anyone to help us, but we know deep in our hearts that more could’ve been done to save her. The doctors that neglected her and the attorneys that turned us down should ask themselves the question, what would they have done if it were their mother?

This is mama. This YouTube video captured her beautiful singing voice.

Update: Franchot is featured in our short film, Faces of Sepsis. 

Source: by Franchot Swanagan (Gladys's son)