LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- A woman who lay bleeding on the emergency room floor of a troubled inner-city hospital died after 911 dispatchers refused to contact paramedics or an ambulance to take her to another facility, newly released tapes of the emergency calls reveal.
Edith Isabel Rodriguez, 43, died of a perforated bowel on May 9 at Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital. Her death was ruled accidental by the Los Angeles County coroner's office.
Relatives said Rodriguez was bleeding from the mouth and writhing in pain for 45 minutes while she was at a hospital waiting area. Experts have said she could have survived had she been treated early enough.
County and state authorities are now investigating Rodriguez's death. Relatives reported she died as police were wheeling her out of the hospital after the officers they had asked to help Rodriguez arrested her instead on a parole violation. Sheriff's Department spokesman Duane Allen said Wednesday that the investigation is ongoing.
In the recordings of two 911 calls that day, first obtained by the Los Angeles Times under a California Public Records Act request, callers pleaded for help for Rodriguez but were referred to hospital staff instead.
"I'm in the emergency room. My wife is dying and the nurses don't want to help her out," Rodriguez's boyfriend, Jose Prado, is heard saying in Spanish through an interpreter on the tapes.
"What's wrong with her?" a female dispatcher asked.
"She's vomiting blood," Prado said.
"OK, and why aren't they helping her?" the dispatcher asked.
"They're watching her there and they're not doing anything. They're just watching her," Prado said.
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