Idaho State House State Affairs Committee March 26, 2012

This is the speech I will give on March 26, 2012 at 08:30 in the Idaho State House of Representatives State Affairs Committee on behalf of Brenna.

Ladies and Gentleman of the Committee,

Thank you for this opportunity to speak on behalf of Senate Bill 1348.

My name is Pamela Dowd, Boise, Idaho. I want to talk about two hospitals with two different attitudes.

I speak today on behalf of my only child, my daughter, Brenna Dowd. She was 27 years old when she suffered a medically unexplained hypoxic brain injury following a retina repair surgery.

On May 26, 2010 at 3 AM, my daughter and I held our last normal conversation. When I went to awaken her for her post-op appointment six hours later, she was breathing but unresponsive.

She was transported to a regional hospital. I was escorted to a darkened pediatric waiting room. Over an hour passed before the ER doctor came to give me an update. That was the first time I gave a request that was denied. I wanted Brenna to know her mother was present. He said it would do no good. I wanted to be at her side. The request was denied.

When she was transferred from ER to CCU, I saw abject terror on her face. The negative talk around her bed scared her. While physicians felt she “couldn’t understand”, she did. She felt their negativity. During the following days, I was repeatedly approached to end her life, starve her to death. She was not brain dead. Her EEG was “pretty good” according to the first neurologist. He said her brain stem was healthy. The second neurologist said it was too early to assess brain damage and know the difference between damage and swelling.

I began researching treatment and rehabilitation. Whenever I spoke with the CCU doctor in charge, her response was: “No matter what you suggest, I will not change my way of treating her." When I asked for my daughter’s own doctors to come, her response was: “There is nothing they can do that we can’t do. Her doctors can only come if I request it.”  When I asked that Brenna’s brain be protected from swelling, the CCU doctor informed me that Brenna did not have the right kind of injury to cause swelling in the brain. This was a statement in direct contradiction to the second neurologist. And the pressure to end my daughter’s life continued.

Then, without my permission and against my direct request not to do so, my daughter was suddenly dumped into a Medicare rated one star nursing home, miles from home.

Fast forward 16 months.

On September 26, 2011, while a relative stayed at home with Brenna  while I went for supplies, Brenna suffered a sudden cardiac arrest.

This time, Brenna was transferred to the hospital of my choice. This time the experience was different. A hospital chaplain came to be with me. When she began to talk to me in what I called “hospice jargon”, I asked her not to use that terminology. She respected my request and stayed by my side most of the next few days.

I was allowed total access to my daughter in ER. I did not leave her side and no one suggested that I do so.

In ICU, Brenna was placed in a medically induced coma with Theurapeutic Hypothermia. This therapy reduces swelling in the brain and protects the brain from secondary injury. When she began having seizures, the doctor ordered more testing.

At all times, my daughter was treated with respect and dignity. I requested that any discussion of the results of her tests be kept out of her room. That request was honored.

When all tests results were in, I knew that this time, my daughter was not going to recover. There would be no rehabilitation.

I asked to take her home. While there was no protocol at that time to take a dying patient home, the staff worked to make it possible.

On October 1, 2011, my daughter came home. We settled her comfortably in her bed and removed her life support. I cuddled my daughter in my arms one last time and this time, I let her go. I said, "Always and ever your Mama loves you. Join hands with Jesus, that's what you must do, and in the blink of God's eye, Mom will be there with you."

The difference in the two hospitals is simple: In the first hospital, they treated a living patient as if she should die. In the second hospital, they treated a dying patient with hope as if she would live.

I can’t help but wonder how much better Brenna’s chances would have been had she received at the first hospital the same level of care she received at the second.

Today is the 26^th, six months since Brenna’s SCA.

On Brenna’s behalf, I urge you to give this bill serious consideration and pass it from Committee.

Thank you.