Doctor won't use hospital

tool name

tool name

Mental patient, 80, chokes on food and dies

An elderly patient died at a state mental hospital in Goldsboro last week after he reportedly choked on his food.

Lawrence Russell Jr., 80, died last Tuesday after the incident at Cherry Hospital. According to a state report, Russell "appeared to choke" while eating his lunch. The staff attempted the Heimlich maneuver and other life-saving measures, according to the report, but could not revive him.

He was a patient on the hospital's geriatric ward.

Rape of patient reported at Johnston Memorial Hospital

Smithfield police are investigating the alleged rape of a patient at Johnston Memorial Hospital.

The 22-year-old woman was "incapacitated" when she was sexually assaulted late Friday or early Saturday, the police report said. She reported the incident Saturday morning.

Police spokesman Lt. Keith Powell said the victim is acquainted with the man who she said raped her. The man was also a patient at the hospital, and is also in his 20s, Powell said.

Patient death endangers federal funds

The death of a patient at Cherry Hospital after about a day without enough food and water led investigators to threaten to take away the hospital's federal money.

The patient, a 50-year-old man whose name the state Department of Health and Human Services did not release, died in his bed at Cherry Hospital in Goldsboro on April 29. He was pronounced dead at Wayne Memorial Hospital.

According to the department, investigators said hospital staff did not pay attention to the man's needs for food and water for a day. Inspectors were at the hospital for several days last week, and Cherry received a letter Monday saying patient safety was in "immediate jeopardy."

Scarcity of mental-health care traps patients in vicious cycle

In the days when mental patients were put away, the symbol of the state mental hospital was a locked door.

Now in North Carolina, it's a revolving one.

Mental patients are rapidly cycling in and out of the state's four mental institutions. Those checking in for stays of one to seven days increased more than 82 percent from 2001 to 2005. Many are admitted multiple times.

Mental patients get stuck in ERs

Across North Carolina, mental patients are routinely languishing for days in emergency rooms ill-equipped to care for them, waiting for a bed to open at one of four state-run psychiatric hospitals.

Often, they pass the time handcuffed or sedated. Law-enforcement officers assigned to guard patients whose illness makes them prone to violent outbursts have occasionally resorted to using Tasers to shock them into submission.

Lanier Cansler, the state's secretary of health and human services, plans to ease the strain by paying private hospitals with taxpayer money to admit and treat more mental patients, especially those who don't qualify for Medicaid.