Six employees of the Maplewood, MN, fire department, including the chief, have been placed on administrative leave after the death of a nursing home resident.
Firefighters and medics were called to the Good Samaritan Society nursing home in Maplewood earlier this month, responding to a call that a 71-year-old resident with Parkinson’s disease had stopped breathing and was unconscious.
Firefighters attempted to resuscitate the resident, and were about to transport her to the hospital when her husband arrived and requested they stop their efforts, according to a police report obtained by the Star Tribune. The woman was taken back into the nursing home, where she died 20 minutes later, according to the report.
Police investigated whether the emergency responders met the legal requirements when they stopped trying to resuscitate the resident since she did not have a “do not resuscitate” directive, Maplewood Police Chief Paul Schnell told the Star Tribune. Despite the police department and county attorney general’s ruling that there was no criminal wrongdoing in the case, the employees were placed on leave on Monday.
The Star Tribune reported that city officials are still working on the case and hoped to have it resolved by the end of the week.
