DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) - The family of a 97-year-old Iowa woman who died of COVID-19 is questioning why a Davenport hospital released her while she was still sick and did not inform her family that she had been sent home.
Helen Lowery died was found Oct. 21 unconscious in a chair in her apartment by a maintenance worker who expected the unit to be unoccupied, the Quad-City Times reported.
“She was taken back to the hospital, put on a ventilator and died two days later,” neighbor Deloris Patton said. “I don’t understand why they let her out of the hospital when she still had COVID. They didn’t even let the family know. No one could help her because we didn’t know she was there.”
Grandson Michael Lowery, who had power of attorney, said the family had no idea she had been sent home, even though he kept in touch with hospital staff and asked to be informed if she was released so a family member could pick her up.
“I love my grandmother dearly,” he said. “There would have been no problem with me, my wife or our kids going to pick her up. She didn’t even have her walker. It was in my car.”
Dr. Kurt Andersen, the hospital’s chief medical officer, said in a statement that federal privacy regulation prevents the hospital from commenting on current or former patients.
Speaking generally, Andersen said patients being treated for COVID-19 “are discharged or remain hospitalized depending upon the individual’s clinical condition and the patient’s choice of care setting.”
Andersen said many patients can safely return home although they are still testing positive for the virus, and such decisions are left to patient and their “care teams.”
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