Radonda Vaught Trial

Mommavik, ADN · Mar 28, 2022

I agree; she was totally negligent. I have read A LOT of opinions and a lot of facts that I was unaware of when she was first found guilty. At that time I felt like many others, that convicting a nurse of criminally negligent homicide for a medication error set a dangerous precedent. Now that I'm aware of more of the facts, however, I do feel this was a just conviction. She DID ignore safe practice and many safeguards set to protect her patient. She had many opportunities to catch her error, from the time she attempted to remove Versed from the medication machine to the time after she gave the medication she assumed to be Versed and walked away from the patient without any monitoring. (The fact that 2 different people told her monitoring was unnecessary doesn't fly, since Versed IV DOES require monitoring per the literature. So looking it up online or in a PDR will give that information quickly.) THAT is why I feel she is guilty of the charge against her. I feel badly for her, but she badly messed up and caused a patient's death and she knows that. That, I think, is worse than anything the courts can do to her. However, my position is that she is not the only person or entity at fault in this death. Why is she the ONLY person being held at fault? It could not have happened if the safeguards against the wrong medication being removed from the machine had been held to, but using the override function has been made an ordinary use in this hospital and many others because of the problems with getting new medications added to a patient's profile in a timely manner. FIX THE PROBLEM. Make sure that dangerous medications such as Vecuronium are harder to remove unless you have 2 codes entered (and 2 nurses who actually DO look at the labels) Fix the problem of having nurses and apparently doctors who are unaware that IV Versed requires at the very least pulse oximeter monitoring, preferably heart rate, respiratory and visual monitoring as well. These things might not have prevented this tragedy but it sure might help prevent the next one. And hold accountable the people who decided the laws did not apply to report this to those who are required to know, including the family. The MEDICAL EXAMINER, for one, was told this was a "natural causes" death, nothing was mentioned about the Vecuronium! That to me is inexcusable! HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE!

Susie2310 · Mar 28, 2022

10 minutes ago, MunoRN said:

Take the Amiodarone black box warning for instance. I would agree that were a bit fast-and-loose with amio, and probably do more harm than good when not truly indicated. So if a patient gets pulmonary obliterans and dies from Amio that was given for stable Aifib, I should be able to pursue reckless homicide charges against all the nurses who willingly gave the patient Amio?

This is my take on this situation: As far as I know, anyone can pursue charges; in this case one could anticipate that the patient's family member/s may file charges, or possibly an external investigator. My understanding is that if the case reaches court, it would be up to the jury to decide whether the standard of care is reasonable and whether the case demonstrated failure to meet the standard of care and whether that failure to meet the standard of care resulted in the patient's death.

Editorial Team / Admin · Mar 28, 2022

7 minutes ago, Susie2310 said:

As far as I know, anyone can pursue charges; in this case one could anticipate that the patient's family member/s may file charges,

No. Anyone can file a civil suit. Only a prosecutor or district attorneys office can file charges.

klone, MSN, RN · Mar 28, 2022

32 minutes ago, Wuzzie said:

You're in FB prison?!?

It’s a fairly regular occurrence for me. The FB bots don’t appreciate irony or metaphor.

MunoRN, RN · Mar 28, 2022

9 hours ago, klone said:

Don't know what to tell you. I also do med error investigations and have participated in MANY an RCA as a facilitator. If you can't be held to the basic standard of always looking at and knowing what medication you're about to give, then THAT terrifies ME.

Seriously, though - the statement that I ALWAYS look at a medication before giving it...terrifies you? That's...perplexing.

And maybe were talking about two different "slippery slopes", but in terms of the idea that it should be up to the nurse alone to keep the patient safe, because as long as they've read the label then the patient won't get the wrong med even without other safety measures then that's what I see as problematic.

This is something we track with barcode scanning and we can look at the video to see if the nurse looked at the med label when they pulled. There's no shortage of examples where otherwise good nurses thought they had the correct med in their hand but didn't.

Susie2310 · Mar 28, 2022

7 minutes ago, Rose_Queen said:

No. Anyone can file a civil suit. Only a prosecutor or district attorneys office can file charges.

I wasn't referring to a civil suit, although you are correct that anyone can file a civil suit. I was thinking of a family member who consults with lawyers, with the subsequent legal investigation resulting in a prosecutor/DA filing charges. I apologize for being unclear.

Susie2310 · Mar 28, 2022

36 minutes ago, MunoRN said:

And maybe were talking about two different "slippery slopes", but in terms of the idea that it should be up to the nurse alone to keep the patient safe, because as long as they've read the label then the patient won't get the wrong med even without other safety measures then that's what I see as problematic.

This is something we track with barcode scanning and we can look at the video to see if the nurse looked at the med label when they pulled. There's no shortage of examples where otherwise good nurses thought they had the correct med in their hand but didn't.

As far as I know, nurses are considered legally to be the last defense before a medication reaches a patient, and this I believe I recall reading just recently when I reviewed information about nursing law and lawsuits that nurses had been involved in in my state.

Giving a medication safely certainly involves more than just reading a medication label, although reading a medication label correctly is critically important. Giving a medication safely involves using the Five Rights and more, and utilizing clinical judgment. Barcode scanning is a very important and helpful adjunct procedure, but by itself it doesn't take the place of using the Five Rights, ascertaining sufficient knowledge of the medication, it's action, side effects, etc., in order to administer the medication safely. Of course safety measures on the part of the facility are necessary too, but my understanding is that the nurse is considered to be the last defense before a medication reaches a patient.

MunoRN, RN · Mar 28, 2022

36 minutes ago, Susie2310 said:

This is my take on this situation: As far as I know, anyone can pursue charges; in this case one could anticipate that the patient's family member/s may file charges, or possibly an external investigator. My understanding is that if the case reaches court, it would be up to the jury to decide whether the standard of care is reasonable and whether the case demonstrated failure to meet the standard of care and whether that failure to meet the standard of care resulted in the patient's death.

Anyone can bring civil suits, but criminal cases are initiated usually by the DA, in some cases an AG or Judge might as well

A clear-cut example of practicing below the standard of care, gross negligence, would have been if Vaught knew she had a paralytic but didn't want to walk all the way back upstairs so she just gave it anyways.

Susie2310 · Mar 28, 2022

Just now, MunoRN said:

Anyone can bring civil suits, but criminal cases are initiated usually by the DA, in some cases an AG or Judge might as well

A clear-cut example of practicing below the standard of care, gross negligence, would have been if Vaught knew she had a paralytic but didn't want to walk all the way back upstairs so she just gave it anyways.

I copied my reply to RoseQueen as it applies to your reply to me also.

"I wasn't referring to a civil suit, although you are correct that anyone can file a civil suit. I was thinking of a family member who consults with lawyers, with the subsequent legal investigation resulting in a prosecutor/DA filing charges. I apologize for being unclear."

klone, MSN, RN · Mar 28, 2022

I never said, nor do I believe, that it’s up to the nurse alone to prevent med errors.

But I firmly believe that any nurse who would not look ONCE at the medication she was pulling up, reconstituting, and pushing, should not be working as a nurse. That’s not basic safe behavior.

Hoosier_RN, MSN · Mar 28, 2022

1 hour ago, klone said:

It’s a fairly regular occurrence for me. The FB bots don’t appreciate irony or metaphor.

Me too. Some of my views and comments aren't wildly popular with the fact checkers or bots...

Anonymous865 · Mar 28, 2022

4 hours ago, sistrmoon said:

Is this available in a transcript online somewhere? I had never heard she had administered versed the day before the incident. And I’m not having much luck finding that info elsewhere.

I don't know of a transcript. The 2nd time the board considered the complaint against her, the board meeting was live streamed. The links to the live stream are here

https://www.tn.gov/content/dam/tn/health/healthprofboards/nursing/meeting-schedule/Nursing Public Notice July 22-33, 2021.pdf

It was 2 days long. The first day was testimony. The 2nd day was the board discussing the case.

Radonda Vaught starts testifying about 3:50 on the first day.

Radonda Vaught Trial

What do you think the verdict should/will be?