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MASSACHUSETTS NURSE NEWSLETTER ::
May/June 2008
Incident at Boston Medical Center alters life and career of RN
Maureen Kontrovitz earned the respect of employers and peers alike throughout her 25 years as a nurse, 20 of which were spent ministering to patients in the ICU. But that stellar career came crashing to a halt one evening in 2007 – and now this veteran RN is trying to pick up the pieces of a life and livelihood that have forever been altered in the aftermath of an on-the-job incident at Boston Medical Center.
“This is a horrific episode I will never be able to forget,” said Kontrovitz, 56, providing details of the Jan. 13, 2007 incident. Kontrovitz was near the end of her shift in an ICU at Boston Medical Center, at the bedside of a patient who was coming out of anesthesia.
“She had been combative coming out of anesthesia, but had been sedated. She was still attached to multiple lines, but she suddenly started to sit up,” said Kontrovitz, who had worked at BMC for three years prior to the incident. “I approached her and that’s when she clamped her full set of teeth down on my left arm – she had her jaws locked on me.”
Alone in the room at the time, Kontrovitz called for assistance. Four co-workers subsequently attempted to release the patient’s mouth from her arm when a surgeon stepped in and took dramatic action.
“He put one hand on my wrist and one on my arm and yanked with all his might – the pain I experienced was greater than I had ever had in my life,” said Kontrovitz, noting that following the surgeon’s appalling action she was seen briefly in the ER, offered one ibuprofen, given a prescription for antibiotics and told she could go back to work.
“Neither I nor the patient who bit me were tested for HIV, I was not checked for Hepatitis and given no time off from work—to this day I wonder if I had not been at the end of my shift if I would have been told to finish it,” she said.
Unable to work for 10 days after what turned out to be a life and career altering episode, Kontrovitz was further disheartened when she learned that the surgeon who had ripped her arm from the patient’s mouth accepted no responsibility for the incident and was less than honest about his part in the event.
With a severely painful and weakened arm that still bore the full mouth imprint of the patient who had bit her, Kontrovitz visited the Employee Health services at BMC upon her return to work, concerned not only about her health but over her ability to perform duties as an ICU nurse.
“I was told to keep using my arm,” she recalled. “I was in continual pain and the arm was in such a weakened condition that I even kept dropping IV bags, and still I was told to keep working.”
By mid-February, with no improvement in her arm and escalated apprehension over her health and capacity to continue working in her unit, Kontrovitz “had had enough.”
At this point, she told her manager that she was experiencing a great deal of pain and weakness in her arm and would not be able to return to work until she saw a specialist.
“So I went home and there was a message on my phone asking me to come in and work extra hours,” she recalled. “I said no.”
Near the end of February, Kontrovitz, who noted that worker’s comp had accepted her case by that time, made an appointment with a doctor at BMC. After three visits the doctor essentially told Kontrovitz there was nothing he could do for her.
She was subsequently diagnosed with nerve damage by a hand specialist unrelated to Boston Medical Center.
Kontrovitz was to spend the next couple months seeking treatment and in physical therapy. During this time she contacted the MNA, after speaking with Eileen McLaughlin, the MNA representative on her floor at BMC. Over the next several months, she was to have numerous conversations and receive assistance from Chris Pontus, MNA health & safety associate director and Joe-Ann Fergus, MNA labor program associate director.
“Chris really listened and that was wonderful because up until then I had felt so totally isolated,” said Kontrovitz. “Chris was very helpful and encouraging.”
“Maureen’s situation was quite compelling from both a health and safety and labor perspective,” said Pontus, noting that “MNA is always there to help guide nurses in situations involving labor disagreements, injury and/or workers compensation.”
“I needed someone to talk to because my entire life was altered; I realized I could never be a bedside nurse again,” said Kontrovitz, who in addition to being a highly regarded nurse is also an equestrian.
In fact, she had relocated to the Massachusetts/ New Hampshire area to work with a nationally noted dressage trainer in the hopes of one day opening her own barn.
“That dream has also been crushed by the Jan. 13, 2007 incident,” she said, noting that she has given up hopes of being a professional horse trainer and has had to retrain her own horses to be exercised without the reins that she can no longer grasp or control.
In July, surgery was performed on the injured arm, which to this day has little strength and causes her unrelenting pain, despite months of physical therapy. Although Kontrovitz had been cleared to return to work in a “one-handed, light-duty” job as early as April 2007, BMC declined to use her services in any capacity. “It seems that if I wasn’t able to perform my duties as an ICU nurse they didn’t want me at all,” said Kontrovitz, who made multiple inquiries about the possibility of performing light duty assignments. Last October she received a termination form letter from BMC and one week later was summoned to a conciliation workers compensation hearing inasmuch as the hospital sought to put a stop to her workers comp payments.
“BMC sought to stop my benefits because I had been cleared for right-handed work, even though they had declined to use me in this capacity,” said Kontrovitz. “In other words, they did not want me in this condition, but they did not want to pay benefits either because I was able to work in some capacity.”
At this point, Kontrovitz looked to Joe-Ann Fergus for the guidance and support that was to help her get through the ensuing months.
“I was left to flounder and Joe-Ann was there for me,” she said.
The cold treatment doled out to Kontrovitz by BMC management also captured the ention of state Rep. Christine Canavan (DBrockton). The legislator, a former nurse and a staunch advocate for nurses’ rights sent a letter to hospital CEO Elaine Ullian on Kontrovitz’s behalf. That letter, said Kontrovitz, never received the courtesy of a response.
“I’m grateful for everything Chris and Joe-Ann did for me and for Rep. Canavan stepping in— the support was important,” said Kontrovitz.
“Last fall when BMC fired me and then tried to stop my workers compensation I was faced with having no income and was close to being on the street; I can’t even describe the anguish I was feeling…and this on top of the physical pain I have to this day as a result of the January 2007 incident,” she said. “After a career spent helping others, there I was with no income and no insurance.” Kontrovitz recently was awarded a lump sum workers comp settlement, one that amounts to one-third of what she was seeking and about three-quarters of what she earned annually at BMC.
Now adapting to “one-armed living” the highly experienced veteran nurse presently works in a telephone triage facility, where she earns about half of her former salary.
“The loss I have experienced is on many levels – my health and income have been compromised, yes, but so has my trust in an institution and a system I hoped would have my well-being in mind to some degree,” she said. “It pains me to say that I was not taken seriously by Boston Medical Center; it was as if the hospital felt I was shirking my duties or trying to get away with a day off.”
Kontrovitz also said the extent of her injuries might have been lessened if health care staff at the hospital was trained in measures to take when confronted with a similar incident. In addition, she pointed to the need for increased staffing.
“I loved my job and I took great pride in it,” said Kontrovitz. “It was a major portion of my identity, so to literally be ripped from it and thrown on the trash heap is devastating.”
“After all is said and done I am left with a hand that is not truly functioning, rebuilding my career from scratch,” she said. “I am left with the very uneasy knowledge that what happened to me could happen to any nurse at BMC, but I am grateful for the MNA’s support and assistance—without it this devastating episode would have been even more difficult.”
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