The Administrative Investigations Board of a Tampa Bay Veteran’s Hospital has concluded that hospice staff violated policy when they accidentally left a dead body unattended in a bathroom for nine hours.
“Hey, Ben. So, the body…”
“Earlier today?”
“Yeah.”
“What about it?”
“It’s still there.”
“In the bathroom?”
“Yeah”
“Paul, the body is still in the bathroom?”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t joke.”
“I’m not.”
“Paul!”
“What?!”
“Why is the body still in the bathroom?! Why hasn’t the morgue come yet?”
“I don’t know! I was going to ask you right now!”
“You were going to ask me why the body isn’t in the morgue yet?”
“Yeah – isn’t that, um, isn’t that, who I ask? About that?”
“No. Because I wasn’t in charge of this incident report, you were, Paul!! I assumed you knew this. I thought, you know, the morgue guy must’ve come already, because you didn’t tell me there was a problem.”
“Yeah. I see that now. Yeah.”
“We are a Veteran’s Hospital for fuck’s sake, this shouldn’t happen.”
“I know, Ben.”
“The patient died before lunch. What time is it?”
“It’s 10pm.”
“Paul, this is, this is horrible. This is just. What the fuck. Why didn’t you tell me he was still in there?”
“I already – look, I thought the protocol was: assume he is there until I tell you the morgue came and got him! And the morgue didn’t come, and you didn’t seem worried, so I wasn’t worried either!”
“But Paul! Again: you’re the point-person for this incident! You’re the one who needs to worry when the morgue doesn’t come! Not me! You’re supposed to tell me if there are problems, and to be able to identify problems on your fucking own!”
“Yeah.”
“Problems like: that dead body is still in the bathroom!”
“I assumed they were still waiting on that paperwork from Mark!”
“Wait – paperwork?”
“Yeah, remember?”
“No, Paul, here’s what I remember: one of the patients in your ward expired around lunch, and as the RN on duty you reported the incident to me, your supervisor. And you told me you were contacting the authorities.”
“I did! I did all that! And the authorities said that “usually the Veteran’s Hospital contacts the morgue directly”, and that we needed to fax them some insurance stuff for the transportation over there – didn’t you get any of this?”
“How would I have gotten this?”
“I passed it on to Mark.”
“Mark? Mark in our HR Department, Mark?”
“No, Mark in Incident Reports.”
“There isn’t a Mark in Incident Reports.”
“Yes there is! There’s a – look, here’s his email – oh.”
“Yeah.”
“I emailed Mark in HR.”
“Yep.”
“Fuck.”
“There’s a Mart in Incident Reports. He went home thirty minutes ago, Paul. Does he have any idea that there is a body in the men’s bathroom?”
“No.”
“Okay. So his job is to report incidents to the authorities. And he sat at his desk all day doing what?”
“I don’t know what Mark does all day.”
“Mart! You fuck!”
“What?”
“Mart! Mart is in Incident Reports! Mark is in HR! I want you to tell me what Mart in Incident Reports did all day today!”
“I don’t know what – ”
“What Mart in Incident Reports did today was: not know that there was a fucking dead body in the bathroom!”
“Is.”
“What?”
“There is a dead body in the bathroom.”
“…Jesus Christ.”
“I’m, I’m a fucking idiot -”
“So, you just, your shift was ending and you thought ‘hm, maybe I should check on that dead body I left in a bathroom this morning.’ And you did, and here we are?”
“Yeah. Basically, yeah. I guess I’m fired.”
“Hm?”
“I’m fired, right?”
“Oh yeah, sorry I thought you said something else. Yes, you’re fired.”
“Out of curiosity, what did you think I said?”
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Written by Anne Lane (http://annelane.net/) and Illustrated by Nicole Monk (http://www.nicolemonk.com/)
The original article that inspired this story: http://www.tampabay.com/news/military/veterans/report-va-staff-left-veterans-body-in-shower-for-nine-hours-tried-to-hide/2305694