Letter from Cathy Morris

Almost 2 years ago, on a Friday night, an ER from on of the smaller hospitals paged my husband Paul. A patient had arrived in cardiac arrest. He was postoperative from heart surgery and was bleeding into his chest. There were no other cardiac surgeons available at that time.

The patient's cardiac surgeon was already performing surgery on another emergency surgery at Queens Hospital. My husband is trained and certified to perform cardiac surgery, but mainly specializes in lung and esophageal cancers, which is considered to be non-cardiac thoracic surgery. He hasn't done cardiac surgery for many years.

Trained as an attorney myself, I advised him that if there were any complications, the patient's family could sue us personally and tak away everything we have worked for our entire lives, but he went in anyway because we knew otherwise the guy had no chance. I worried for the next five hours until I heard from him. The stress from being called upon to operate under these circumstances is a great burden as our malpractice insurance will not cover something we do not have privileges to do, however Paul thought he could stabilize the patient until the patient's surgeon was available, giving him a chance to stay alive.

Long story short, the patient coded in the ER while Paul was there, he cracked open the patient's chest in the ER and hand pumped him. They called an ambulance, Paul rode with him, hand in his chest, pumping the whole way over to Queens until he was wheeled into the OR and Paul and the patient's cardiac surgeon did the repair. The patient lived.

With regard to the argument the trial layers are making that there is an increase in doctors here, so there doesn't need to be reform, I bet there is not enough of an increase of physicians in the high-risk categories that matter most in an emergency.

Catherine Morris, Kaneohe
Wife of Dr. Paul Morris