Witness testimony continued this week in the wrongful death trial of Grace Schara, a 19-year-old with Down syndrome who died in a Wisconsin hospital days after being admitted for a COVID-19 infection. Grace’s sister and expert witnesses testified that doctors violated the standard of care and principles of informed consent.
Grace’s family sued Ascension St. Elizabeth Hospital in April 2023 and filed an amended complaint in July 2023, alleging the hospital’s COVID-19 treatment protocols directly resulted in Grace’s death in October 2021, a week after admission.
The trial began last week at the State of Wisconsin Circuit Court for Outagamie County. The lawsuit names several defendants, including some Ascension doctors and nurses and the Wisconsin Injured Patients and Family Compensation Fund.
Grace’s older sister, Jessica Vander Heiden, testified Tuesday that she was unaware that the hospital had placed a “do not resuscitate” (DNR) order in Grace’s chart until shortly before her death and that, in Grace’s final moments, hospital staff refused to intervene and did not honor her family’s repeated requests to revoke the DNR.
Expert witnesses for the plaintiffs testified that there were multiple violations of the standard of care by Ascension doctors and nurses.
Dr. Gilbert Berdine, an associate professor of medicine at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, said that this was the first malpractice case where he testified as an expert witness for plaintiffs and explained why he chose to do so.
“The breaches of the standard of care were egregious, and I could not live with myself without answering the call to review and give advice on this case,” Berdine said.
Hellbound and Down 