Hospital Sanctioned After Third Death

The Ben Taub Hospital death that resulted in the government last month assuming greater oversight of the Houston safety-net hospital involved a patient left unmonitored and ultimately found passed out in a bathroom, according to a federal report.

The report, released Tuesday by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, revealed the hospital had lost track of the ER patient, a 66-year-old Hispanic man, hours after lab results showed his condition was critical. He died April 12 of cardiac arrest after staff unsuccessfully tried to perform CPR.

“The facility failed to provide staff in the emergency center retraining on timely monitoring of patients and reporting of critical laboratory values,” says the CMS report. “This finding puts all patients in the facility's emergency center, health and safety at risk.”

The death was the third in the Texas Medical Center to recently result in the hospital being sanctioned.

Ben Taub publicly disclosed the death and CMS action in late June. George Masi, CEO of Harris Health, wrote staff at the time that the death stemmed “from an ineffective process in patient monitoring and communication of critical lab values.”

As a result of its investigation into the death, CMS removed Ben Taub’s “deemed status,” a component of Medicare and Medicaid participation. The hospital will remain under government authority — instead of DNV GL Healthcare, its accrediting agency — until it demonstrates it is in compliance with CMS’ “conditions of participation.”

CMS took the same action against Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center and MD Anderson Cancer Center earlier this year. The agency found fault at both hospitals following the death of patients getting bad blood transfusions.

All three hospitals remain a participant in Medicare and Medicaid programs.

Houston Chronicle
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