https://www.whio.com/news/judge-orders- ... RPF6WMF34/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I'm not a lawyer but the right to try act from 2018 implies that yes the patient is entitled in this case.On Aug. 23 Judge Gregory Howard ordered the hospital to give Jeffrey Smith, who is a COVID-19 patient on a ventilator, Ivermectin, WCPO reported. Oster did amend the order and is allowing physicians at the hospital to stop giving Smith the drug if a life-threatening side effect occurs.
Jeffrey Smith’s wife Julie Smith testified on Thursday and said she wanted her husband to be treated with the drug because it gave her hope.
“I didn’t want to just sit there and let him die,” Julie Smith said in her testimony, according to WCPO.
Charles Galvin, counsel for West Chester Hospital, argued that Smith was not “entitled to receive off label medical treatment from a healthcare provider of her choosing.” Additionally, Galvin said the hospital was not “obligated to provide a highly controversial medication that is discouraged by the FDA, CDC, AMA, and every credentialed, board certified, treating physician at the hospital,” WCPO reported.
The next comment could be taken as really disgusting. The "public good"? What about the individual patient? If the first article is correct, it sounded like the hospital basically wrote the guy off. I guess according to the lawyer for the hospital it would be better for "the public good" to just let the patient die than even attempt something which might possibly work.Jeffrey Smith was prescribed the drug by Dr. Fred Wagshul, an instructor at Wright State University and pulmonologist in Centerville.
Galvin argued that the order to continue with the treatment does not serve the public good and cited the potential harmful side effects.
After Julie Smith said her husband’s condition had improved since receiving the treatment, Ralph Lorigo, counsel for Smith, said in his counter-argument that the drug was an “alternative that has proven to help.
They are awaiting Judge Oster’s ruling.