We can choose to take care of each other, which means demanding proper funding and accountability in our health system.

Thanks for reading. Thanks especially to Rheanna's sister, Kassandra, for advocating in hopes others don't have to suffer as she has.
www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/artic...

I am in awe of the compassionate and brilliant health workers who work in Ontario - including those who helped answer my many medical Qs as I wrote this. We can have a world-class health system here. Many of us can remember when ERs weren't crowded, when specialists weren't booked years in advance.

Health workers and families have been sounding alarms for years about severe underfunding of health care.
There have been two other major stories in the past week about sepsis deaths in Ontario hospitals. A mother who left behind three children, including a newborn. And an 18-year-old boy.

Zooming out further, it wasn't just the ER that failed Rheanna. It was also the larger health system -- specialist consults were delayed and nurses fought for hours to get Rheanna transferred to the ICU. An ICU doctor was cautioned for missing red flags and dismissing nurses' concerns.

She explains that female physicians practice differently than male physicians, and their presence can positively influence the practices of their male colleagues. (Despite the "woke" battles, studies objectively show that diversity in health care leads to better outcomes for everyone).

Dr. Michelle Cohen, one of the physicians who initially complained about Dr. Duic, points out that other male emergency doctors who saw Rheanna also didn't take her symptoms as seriously as they should have.

On the second visit, it was Dr. Duic who saw her. The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario found his management of Rheanna “showed a lack of knowledge, skill and judgment” and pointed out he had been cautioned or counselled four times in the past. His license was suspended.

In early 2022, 19-year-old Rheanna Laderoute visited Southlake emerg, explaining she had an abortion 2 weeks earlier and was still experiencing pain and bleeding - concerning signs of an infection. She would visit the hospital three times total, in the space of 10 days, before she died of sepsis.

After that investigation, Dr. Marko Duic resigned as chief but he continued to practice as a physician at Southlake hospital's emerg. Since 2018, Southlake added 2 women to its emergency department of 17 physicians -- it remains an outlier when compared to other departments its size.

@tuthanhha.bsky.social‬ the link is fixed in this one :)