Samuel Bardwell is a 20-year-old college athlete who suffers from severe anxiety and post-traumatic distress order.
He takes the drug Klonopin for his condition.
“He was on medication for his anxiety but was off his meds for two days because he couldn’t get to the pharmacy before it closed,” his father, Donald Bardwell, told The Mercury News.
His condition got so bad that he collapsed during a basketball practice on his first day of summer basketball class after suffering a panic attack.
So, was rushed to El Maino Hospital in Los Gatos, California by the paramedics after he collapsed.
“He wasn’t looking too good,” his coach, Scott Eitelgeorge, said. “It looked like he was having a pretty severe anxiety attack. Sam played for maybe five minutes before he had to step out. He collapsed on the grass outside the weight room. When we went outside he tried to get up but fell back down.”
His dad met him at the hospital. They assumed that they would receive professional medical attention at the hospital but found that it was anything but.
They didn’t count on being harassed and humiliated by one of the hospital’s physicians, Dr. Beth Keegstra.
Now that doctor has been suspended after her treatment of Bardwell was caught on video. First, they made him wait for a ridiculous amount of time while the doctor was allegedly laughing and talking with her co-workers. Then Bardwell says they were rude to him, physically abusive, and refused to give him anxiety medication.
“They treated us like we were there just to get drugs,” Donald Bardwell said. “We were there for four hours and the doctor finally came in with a security guard. She didn’t even say hello or ask why he was there, just came in with guns blazing. That’s why I started the video.”
Bardwell was confused about why they brought in a security guard and treated him so badly.
“I did nothing wrong. I did not raise my voice, I was not aggressive. I didn’t have the intent or the ability to even be aggressive,” he said. “I have no other words for it. I’m just so confused of why somebody would treat me like that. Without being aggressive, without me being hostile. You know, they were the ones being hostile from the beginning. They were the ones being confrontational from the beginning. I couldn’t. I was numb head to toe.”
You can clearly hear this on the tape.
“I’m sorry sir, you are the least sick of all the people who are here who are dying,” Keegstra can be heard saying. “He can’t inhale. Wow! You must be dead. Are you dead, sir? I don’t understand. You are breathing just fine.”
She then is seen aggressively and angrily yanking his arm and tells him that he’s “full of shit.” Thankfully, there was one nurse who was nice enough to drug test to confirm there were no drugs in his system so they ended up treating giving him fluids, supplements and pain medication.
“They did not give him Klonopin,” Donald Bardwell said. “All he needed was a pill or two until he could get his prescription.”
As a result, Keegstra was removed from the hospital’s schedule.
“We take this matter very seriously and the contracted physician has been removed from the work schedule pending further investigation,” El Camino Hospital CEO Dan Woods said in a statement, according to KMOV.
The hospital also said they contacted their contracted provider, Vituity, who employs Keegstra so they could remove her from their list of approved emergency room doctors.
“We are saddened that a patient in our care was affected by this behavior and are working to ensure this never happens again,” Vituity spokeswoman Allison Kundu said. “We are conducting a thorough investigation into the matter.”
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