Hospital Medication Error Kills Marine

In the United States, service members or their families cannot sue formedical malpractice or wrongful death. The reason is something called the Feres Doctrine, a law that bars members of the military from bringing personal injury lawsuits against the military.  Cristina Corbin of Foxnews.com wrote an article in December describing the unfortunate events that took the life of a marine.  The family was never compensated and wrongdoers were never punished.

Medical tests showed that Ezequiel Freire had a large mass in his chest believed to be Hodgkin's lymphoma. He was transported to Portsmouth Naval Medical Center where 20 different doctors treated him with 8 different drugs for pain, anxiety and sleeplessness. It was not the Hodgkin's Disease that killed him.  Instead it was a hospital medication error involving pain killers.  Fentanyl, a powerful narcotic along with the painkillers Oxycodone and Oxycontin, proved to be a deadly mixture. His cause of death as stated on his Death Certificate was "Multi drug toxicity".

Corbin wrote:

Ezequiel Freire, a 20-year-old Marine who spent eight months in Afghanistan, died Feb. 13 after doctors served him a deadly cocktail of narcotics and sedatives as he awaited cancer treatment at Portsmouth Naval Medical Center in Virginia, his family said.

Freire was never put on a heart monitor and his family expressed concern several times about the amount of medication he was given. 

The Naval Criminal Investigative Service conducted an investigation into these very sad events, and they will send the report to the hospital for review, and the hospital will have authority over the punishments given to doctors.