Boulder, CO — The woman credited with blowing the whistle on a suspicious death at a Boulder medical facility has been fired from her nursing job.
Karmon Babcock, 27, said she was terminated from her job as a certified nursing assistant at Terrace Heights Care Center after she went to authorities to report that a patient was left to choke on her own vomit and that paperwork was later destroyed.
“What I saw was eating me up,” she said. “I had to do something.”
Barbara Busch Endres died March 9 at the rehabilitative and respite care facility at 2121 Mesa Drive. Her death certificate said she died of cardiac arrest.
A state health department investigation found Endres, 67, was not properly resuscitated after she became ill and that two nurses were aware some of her medical records had been thrown away. Nurses Christopher Ballard and Judy Garrett were fired from the center, according to Terrace Heights officials.
Police are now looking into whether any criminal charges should be filed.
Babcock said that after witnessing efforts to resuscitate Endres, she went to a lawyer, who contacted health officials. Three weeks later, she was told not to come back to Terrace Heights because she had been fired.
“Here I thought I was doing the right thing. I know I was doing the right thing,” Babcock said.
Endres' family commended Babcock's courage. “That took a lot of guts,” said Virginia Schroeder, one of Endres' three daughters.
Endres checked into Terrace Heights six days before her death after spending a couple of weeks in Boulder Community Hospital fighting pneumonia and a urinary tract infection, Schroeder said. She intended to spend a brief time there until she was well enough to return home.
Endres specified during her admittance that she wanted every measure taken to save her life if she became chronically ill, Schroeder said.
“You would hope if you make that sort of request that it will be honored,” Schroeder said.
Leroy Baker, an administrator at Terrace Heights, said he could not comment on Babcock's firing, but did say: “There's a lot more to the story.”
Babcock said that after a year in the nursing industry she is looking for a new line of work.
According to the state health department, 15 complaints have been investigated at the Boulder facility since March 2000, including physical and verbal assaults by employees on patients.
(This article courtesy of Steven Ertelt and the Pro-Life Infonet email newsletter. For more information or to subscribe go to www.prolifeinfo.org or email infonet@prolifeinfo.org.)
