TWO DAYS, TWO DEATHS OF PSYCHIATRIC PATIENTS
Comments by Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD on:
CORONER INVESTIGATES RESTRAINT DEATH
By Dave Reynolds, Inclusion Daily Express
January 31, 2001
HAMILTON, ONTARIO--On the afternoon of January 15, [fb: 2001] Wayne
Winters, 39, struggled while laying on his stomach on the kitchen floor of his home
[Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD:
a group home?] .
Three staff members were holding him in this position -- one on each of his
shoulders and one on his legs -- when his body went limp and he stopped
breathing.
[Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD:
If on psychiatric drugs that are cardiac poisons, the struggle need not
be long or hard, aften the case, I find, with these restraint deaths.]
The staff members turned him over, started CPR, and called for an
ambulance.
He was declared dead a short time later.
Now, Regional Coroner Dr. David Eden is waiting for toxicology tests to
help him determine exactly why Winters died
[Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD:
Nor, do there still have to be detectable
levels of any of the cardiotoxic drugs in the system. The critical question is: How many
such drugs, what doses, and for how long. There may have been no drugs given for
days weeks or even months. The drugs may have long ago done their damage to the
heart and it may be permanent and irreversible. Such was the case with Matthew Smith, 14, of
Clawson, Michigan who fell off his skateboard and died. The Ritalin he had been on for 8 years had
done it's damage, very apparent to the Medical Examiner, under the microscope, near-impossible to
detect on physical exam. Matthew might have died in a childish wrestling match or, were he unlucky
enough, while being restrained in psychiatric detention.
As we know the majority with a
psychiatric 'disease' label (none of them bona fide diseases) are on one or several drugs
almost all of the time. Nary a prescribing opportunity is lost] .
Autopsy results did not pin-point the exact cause of his death.
The position the staff members had Winters in, often called a "prone
restraint",
has been linked to many similar deaths which have come to the public's
attention over the past few years. The position places the person's own
weight, and often that of the people doing the restraint, on the
chest and diaphragm, thereby slowing the person's breathing and heart rate.
Some suffer heart attacks. Some die from asphyxiation -- lack of air.
Sometimes certain medications increase the risk of death
[Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD:
The majority of
psychiatric drugs carry the risk of cardiac side effects, and, taken long enough, for
damage to virtually every organ system, most of all the brain. The are given precisely
because they alter/damage the brain, both short- and long-term.] .
Winter's family claims the staff of Harley Home performed the restraint
improperly, that they were only supposed to use two staff members, rather
than three. An official of the Brantford and District Association of
Community Living, which operates Harley Home, told the Toronto Star that no
policies were broken, but refused to comment further until after the
investigation is completed.
Winter, who had autism
[Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD:
'autism' is a blanket term, like 'cerebral palsy' denoting
definite, diffuse brain damage/injury, usually present from birth with mild moderate or
severe mental subnormality/retardation]
, moved out of South-Western Regional Centre, an
institution housing people with developmental disabilities in Blenheim,
Ontario less than a year ago. He had spent almost 30 years on a "high-risk"
ward at the facility.
[Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD:
Just yesterday (1 31 01) I wrote of the death from a 'severe
psychiatric disorder' of Chris Hall, just 33, of Tulsa, OK
(See DEATH OF YET ANOTHER YOUNG PSYCHIATRIC PATIENT).
Strange,there is no such
thing as a bona fide, verifiable psychiatric disease, which is what psychiatrists mean
when they say 'disorder'. Virtually all of of these psychiatric patients dying before their
time, whether with or without restraints in the mix are on or have been on drugs that are
heart poisons. Such drugs therefore are a likely causal factor--and the most important
of all--in all such deaths. Their hearts need careful pathological study and even electron
microscopic study, where possible. Ritalin, for example causes characteristic,
Ritalin-specific changes seen only on electron microscopy (Fisher, Fisher and
Henderson. For full references, see my web site,'Death by ADHD'
). Such changes are produced in
100% of experimental rodents, within
weeks, feeding them doses of Ritalin comparable to those fed millions of the
schoolchildren of the US and Canada, as nowhere else in the world. What
government agencies are tracking the epidemic deaths due, not to psychiatric
diseases--there are no such things--but to the poisons they prescribe in the name of
help.]
In October 1998, the Hartford Courant (Connecticut) ran an excellent
investigative series entitled "Deadly Restraint". That series is still
available on line at this web address:
http://courant.ctnow.com/projects/restraint
The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) continued where the
Courant left off, compiling reports of restraints and seclusion abuse
in the United States from October 1998 through March 2000:
http://www.nami.org/update/hartford.html
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