The tragic story about Rutheford woman Elizabeth O’Kane’s disturbing death verification in a shopping centre car park, has been read onto the record at State Parliament and next week will make national news on A Current Affair.
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Fairfax Media told the story earlier this month about Mrs O’Kane, 71, who was diagnosed with terminal cancer in April. Her wish was to die at her daughter Anna Krausert’s Rutherford home and have her death verified there.
Her final wishes did not happen and instead two undertakers and a handful of rubberneckers looked on as a doctor listened for a heartbeat from Mrs O’Kane, whose corpse lay in a body bag in the back of a panel van, parked in a public street.
When Mrs O’Kane’s family contacted her GP to verify her death, they were told they would have to arrange to bring her body to the surgery for another doctor to examine. The family was not advised other avenues for death verification at home could have been provided.
The issue has angered Member for Maitland Jenny Aitchison who has vowed to fight for a death verification protocol review and this week read a letter from Mrs O’Kane’s grandson Josef Krausert-O’Connor in State Parliament.
Josef said the health system had failed his grandmother. “The State’s policy on death verification has failed my family in giving Nan the dignity of dying at home,” he said. “I hope this statement ensures the practices regarding death verification are investigated so this experience will not happen again.”
Mrs Aitchison said this was the “most shocking, abhorrent and disgraceful” story she had ever heard. “This woman was in palliative care, and this was what she had to go through. Her family had been dealing with this since April. Not being given enough information about other available options is an absolute disgrace,” Mrs Aitchison said. “I never want to see a situation like this ever happening again.
“There is a protocol but it needs to be reviewed. I have written to Health Minister Brad Hazzard and put forward questions on notice to nail down this process a bit better,” she said. “I have witnessed a number of unsettling events in my role as Member for Maitland but none have horrified me as much as the treatment of Mrs Elizabeth O'Kane.
“A beloved mother, grandmother and friend was exposed to a confused and brutal system which is in desperate need of reform. We need to reform the death verification process before another abhorrent event like this occurs.”
Josef has started an online petition which has now almost 900 signatures calling for the family to be heard and better protocols put in place.