Applications , Click Here To Subscribe , Submission Guidelines , Link Section Documents on this website may be freely distributed if unaltered and left in their entirety. Please contact us if you wish to reproduce our content. When tried, the ceiling for damages was disputed and deemed unconstitutional. The patient would be admitted for coronary artery bypass grafting , a common treatment for symptomatic heart disease. During the procedure the patient would receive anesthesia and an endotracheal tube would be placed by a certified registered nurse anesthetist .
Nurse anesthesia is an advanced clinical nursing specialty.
Examination later would show that the endotracheal tube had been placed in the patient's esophagus. Amid distractions like sirens and flashing lights, dangerous debris, and the cries of victims, rescuers can actually cause life-threatening complications by unwittingly inserting the tube in a patient's esophagus rather than the trachea, sending oxygen to the stomach instead of the lungs. Most experts estimate this occurs in 2 to 5 percent of patients, though a few doctors have suggested that the problem is much more common. The lack of oxygen may have led to the patient's cardiac arrest during the procedure. The plaintiff argued that for the damages suffered by the patient, the ceiling was unconstitutional.