Nurses Call the Governor of Tennessee

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The state of TN is prosecuting nurse Radonda Vaught for reckless homicide. You can contact the Governor or DA to let him know what you think about this choice.

Governor Bill Lee

1st Floor, State Capitol
Nashville, TN 37243
(615) 741-2001
email: [email protected]

District Attorney Glenn Funk

9 minutes ago, juan de la cruz said:

We don't really know what her role is in that business, for all we know her husband may be running it since she works as a nurse. I'll be 50 this year so she's young to me. The skill being so basic, repetitive, mundane, whatever we can call it made it so easy to overlook things in my opinion, just like with other scenarios of inattentional blindess. Anyway, these are all conjecture...I don't now her state of mind when it happened.

The fact that she was going off the unit to administer, after an override, without scanners and protections and monitoring madr this very non-mundane IMHO...

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Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.
5 minutes ago, mtmkjr said:

The fact that she was going off the unit to administer, after an override, without scanners and protections and monitoring madr this very non-mundane IMHO...

Yes, which was in itself is a set-up for mistakes now that we're dissecting it. Again, I'd like to cross examine this nurse and find out how often she does this override, did she ever think of looking Versed up by its generic name, does she give Versed without checking her patient after the dose. Because if she truly gave 1mg of IV Versed there's actually a big chance this patient would not have died this way..so many questions, so little answers for now.

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Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.
1 hour ago, LilPeanut said:

The not being reported to the ME I don't think had anything to do with any sort of administrative cover up or desire to protect the hospital, just a provider trying to protect a nurse, who s/he had heard gossip about, but didn't know for sure. S/He should have said there was a concern for a med error, but s/he didn't.

I'm sure the med error was passed by the providers to each other during sign out, how can it not be. It would have made my jaw drop if I were the NP that was told that. It sounds like Vanderbilt uses Epic for EMR and we do too where I work. I've completed death documentation on Epic and if theirs is similar to ours, you go through a checklist of questions that prompt you to call the ME if you said yes to any of the questions, one being if the death was a result of a med error.

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Specializes in Cardiac Stepdown, PCU.

Reading these threads have caused some serious conflicts within me. Homicide charges seem extreme, but I do believe this woman should, as someone else said, have to stand before a Judge and explain herself.

I see a lot of people question so many other aspects of this case, but they never question the nurse's choice of actions. How can you justify not even *looking* at the medication? It seem's like a lot of people are grasping at straws to say she was overwhelmed, or had too many patients, or there were too many expectations of her and not enough resources, that she was being set up for failure and being thrown under the bus and magically somehow it's the primary RN's fault. Did anyone even read the report? Others want to blame the MD for ordering versed opposed to say, Ativan. I don't understand what difference that would have made. She just would have typed in AT rather than VE, pulled whatever popped up and continued on her way.

I want to support this woman, as a nurse. I do. I just can't. I've made errors. I've had near-misses. I've supported my coworkers through their errors and near-misses. But this? It just doesn't *feel* right. This was not "just some med error" or just a little mistake anyone of us could have made. This was a grievous error that resulted in a woman's death. Am I terrified that, by this case, all of a sudden nurses all over the US are going to get charged criminally for any and every mistake we make? Not at all. Does it feel like a wake up call? Very much so.

I shared this story with a friend of mine. He doesn't work in the medical field. I explained it very simply as a nurse who gave the wrong dose of the wrong medication to a patient, and subsequently the patient died. That nurse is now being charged with homicide. Did he think she should be charged? No. He didn't. He thought that was a pretty harsh. I then sent him the CMS report to read. He read it twice because he couldn't believe what he was reading. He had a hard time believing this woman was a nurse. He still felt that homicide was a bit harsh, maybe instead, manslaughter. He did feel that she should be charged with something, and as before... have to explain herself before a judge, and potentially, a jury.

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4 minutes ago, juan de la cruz said:

Yes, which was in itself is a set-up for mistakes now that we're dissecting it. Again, I'd like to cross examine this nurse and find out how often she does this override, did she ever think of looking Versed up by its generic name, does she give Versed without checking her patient after the dose. Because if she truly gave 1mg of IV Versed there's actually a big chance this patient would not have died this way..so many questions, so little answers for now.

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Is this what you meant to say? I don't know how she would have died this way if she had actually given the Versed

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4 minutes ago, juan de la cruz said:

Yes, which was in itself is a set-up for mistakes now that we're dissecting it. Again, I'd like to cross examine this nurse and find out how often she does this override, did she ever think of looking Versed up by its generic name, does she give Versed without checking her patient after the dose. Because if she truly gave 1mg of IV Versed there's actually a big chance this patient would not have died this way..so many questions, so little answers for now.

Didn't you find it disturbing that she wasn't even sure how much she gave when she thought it was Versed? She said she followed the instructions on the vial. That makes it a 1mg/1ml concentration (yes I know it wasn't actually Versed but she thought it was) The math is not difficult. She pushed 2ml (or potentially 8 but I doubt that) so 2mg. Two problems with that. It was supposed to be 1mg and she didn't know how much she pushed. Was she just being evasive.

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Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.
5 minutes ago, mtmkjr said:

Is this what you meant to say? I don't know how she would have died this way if she had actually given the Versed

Yes, she may not have even had bad consequences from that dose...maybe loopy for a bit which was the point.

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Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.
3 minutes ago, Wuzzie said:

Didn't you find it disturbing that she wasn't even sure how much she gave when she thought it was Versed? She said she followed the instructions on the vial. That makes it a 1mg/1ml concentration (yes I know it wasn't actually Versed but she thought it was) The math is not difficult. She pushed 2ml (or potentially 8 but I doubt that) so 2mg. Two problems with that. It was supposed to be 1mg and she didn't know how much she pushed. Was she just being evasive.

Actually, the act of mixing this medication without checking the name right before her orientee (presumably) is what irritates me about her actions. How can someone who works in the ICU do that? It's not a matter of a nurse in a moment of confusion ran a drip of vecuronium instead of vasopressin on a patient with mulitple IV pumps. She only had to give one medication to get it right...ugh.

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Vaught, who still has her license with the state and was able to get a job at TriStar Centennial Medical Center, created her own GoFundMe account to raise money for legal expenses. In a matter of four days, it raised more than $50,000. While she is currently employed at the hospital, a spokesperson said that she is currently suspended and has no contact with patients since February 4, the day she was charged .

From this article:

Support Grows for Ex VUMC Nurse Charged With Reckless Homicide

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Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.
10 minutes ago, mtmkjr said:

From this article:

Support Grows for Ex VUMC Nurse Charged With Reckless Homicide

Did she mention this error to the manager at the CV-ICU at Tristar Centennial Medical Center when she was interviewing? my guess is no.

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17 minutes ago, juan de la cruz said:

Actually, the act of mixing this medication without checking the name right before her orientee (presumably) is what irritates me about her actions. How can someone who works in the ICU do that? It's not a matter of a nurse in a moment of confusion ran a drip of vecuronium instead of vasopressin on a patient with mulitple IV pumps. She only had to give one medication to get it right...ugh.

I have observed over the years nurses who take pride in being super-confident and efficient at the expense of safety.

That appears to be the message the orientee was getting here.

That can be very intimidating to the new nurse whose sensibilities are being attacked in being told, "This is how we do it."

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Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).
47 minutes ago, juan de la cruz said:

I have a feeling there won't be any nurses or physicians in this jury.

Just as an interesting side note, 20 years ago I was the defendant in a civil case where the plaintiff had a $50,000 suit against me. I told my lawyer, "If the jury is to be truly of my peers, there needs to be some nurses on it!" My lawyer said that probably wouldn't happen.

Lo and behold, three of the jurors were RNs and the verdict ended with me merely having to pay a few thousand in court costs!

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