Saskatoon Couple Traumatized At Local Hospital
Wednesday, January 16, 2008 at 15:12
A Saskatoon woman says her husband is having more serious seizures brought on by stress after going through a traumatic experience recently at a local hospital.
Melanie Wozniak and her husband Tyler were at St. Paul’s Hospital on January 7th, because she was having a miscarriage.
Wozniak says Tyler went to go get a phone card, but didn’t return to her room.
She was later told he had an epileptic seizure at the hospital cafeteria and somehow wound up in handcuffs under the watch of security guards.
She says it appears he started eating something he picked up at the cafeteria while still disoriented, and was accused of stealing.
Wozniak says when she was finally allowed to see him, he was lying face down on a bed in a locked room with his hands cuffed behind his back.
She says she was told he had been violent with security guards — something she maintains only happened because they didn’t know how to deal with someone experiencing a mild seizure.
Despite her pleas to be allowed to enter the room, she says she was refused access and taken back to her own room — but could hear her husband’s screams for the next hour or so.
Wozniak says he ended up having more seizures brought on by stress after hospital staff tried injecting him with drugs while holding him down.
She says she was only allowed to see him again when the drugs weren’t having the desired effect.
According to Wozniak, she convinced hospital staff to let him be during his next seizure, which she says amounted to little more than him playing with his pant leg.
She also says her husband can’t talk about the situation without experiencing another stress-induced seizure.
Wozniak says it’s too soon to say if she will take any action against the hospital — but she is talking to the patients’ advocate.
The president and CEO of St. Paul’s Hospital confirms an incident did take place between some of the hospital’s guards and Wozniak’s husband.
Brenda Fitzgerald says they have conducted a review and determined that Wozniak’s husband initiated the encounter between himself and a guard.
Fitzgerald also says the security guards acted within reason and did nothing wrong when they used force against him.
Fitzgerald says a staff member met with Melanie Wozniak yesterday, and she was given access to security reports.