Hospital locked in battle over patient’s guardianship

Hospital locked in battle over patient’s guardianship


Originally Published on Thursday, March 15, 2012

By Taylor Provost / The Daily Item

CAMBRIDGE — A lawyer representing North Shore Medical Center filed a motion Wednesday to remove two women as legal guardians of their brother, a patient at Union Hospital, after one of the women caused numerous disruptions in the hospital, the lawyer said.

“(The woman) has interfered with the treatment of her brother... and interfered with the treatment of the other patients,” attorney Robert Ledoux told Judge Spencer Kagan at Middlesex Probate and Family Court.

But the accused woman, Lauren DeCruz, 65, of Lynn, said she is concerned about the way hospitals, including Union, have treated her brother, Richard Bianchi, because he is a diagnosed schizophrenic.

“I just think Richard has the right to be treated the same way someone without mental illness is treated,” DeCruz told the judge.

Ledoux said nurses in the Intensive Care Unit at Union called Lynn Police on DeCruz last week after she caused a disruption in the ICU following an ethics consult regarding Bianchi’s care, and she was given a no trespass order.

“Families of other patients had to be removed because she was so loud,” Ledoux said.

DeCruz said she argued with Union Hospital personnel over their treatment of Bianchi after he stopped breathing. Bianchi, 56, has Stage 4 lung cancer and other ailments in addition to his mental illness. She maintains the police did not issue a no trespassing order, but said she has been sending her husband in her place to prevent more disruption.

“There’s no piece of paper that says I can’t go on the property,” DeCruz said.

Ledoux said his clients believe there is a “do not resuscitate” order in effect for Bianchi, but admitted to Kagan that he isn’t sure where it came from. DeCruz said her brother never signed the order, and, as a mental patient, it should be invalid if he did.

“The (order) was very much misinterpreted, falsified and kept from the family,” DeCruz claimed.

DeCruz, who was a nurse for 35 years, said she plans to take care of Bianchi at her own home with the help of hospice care if she maintains guardianship.

Kagan appointed an attorney on behalf of Bianchi to serve as a “buffer” between DeCruz and the hospital, and the sisters will remain the guardians for now. The attorney is expected to report back to the court as soon as Friday, Kagan said.

“I’m very happy about the lawyer being appointed,” DeCruz said Wednesday night. “I think (Kagan) is saying he wants to see all the facts and hear everyone’s side of what happened.”

Taylor Provost can be reached at tprovost@itemlive.com.

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Editor's note: Alice R. Gore Estate value about 1 million dollars: Alice R. Gore, deceased, a disabled 99 year old ward of the Probate Court of Cook County, Judge Kawamoto’s courtroom was hours away from ending up in the Cook County Morgue. Alice's estate was depleted by probate court parasites and there were reportedly no funds to bury her. Her loving family paid for the burial expenses so that Alice would not have to suffer the indignity of being stacked like an Auschwitz inmate in the Cook County morgue. The judge allowed an easily manipulated mentally disabled granddaughter to be appointed as Alice’s guardian and yet no sanctions were instituted against the judge or court officers for this blatant infraction of the law.

The court instituted a similar "abridgement of visitation"  when Alice's daughter justifiably objected to the method of treatment in a nursing home. Lucius Verenus, Schoolmaster,  ProbateSharks.com

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