A settlement has been reached between the town of Medway and the family of a man who died after paramedics allegedly did not provide him oxygen and failed to secure him to a gurney, allowing him to fall off.
Susan LaPorte, the wife of Kenneth LaPorte Sr., sued the town of Medway after he died in April 2022, alleging negligence from the town, which operated Medway Ambulance Service. Medway discontinued its ambulance service after LaPorte’s death.
The parties settled and the case was dismissed March 13 in Penobscot County Superior Court. No details of the settlement were included in court records. Lawyers for LaPorte and Medway did not respond to requests for comment at time of publication.
An ambulance was called for Kenneth LaPorte, 72, around 3 a.m. April 16, 2022, because his oxygen saturation level was low, the lawsuit said.
When emergency medical technicians arrived at the home, they did not take LaPorte’s vital signs before having him walk “an unreasonable distance” to the ambulance instead of using the gurney and wheelchair ramp at the home, the lawsuit said.
The oxygen LaPorte used did not have a tube long enough for the walk and an EMT disconnected his oxygen and then “negligently failed” to give LaPorte portable oxygen during the 50-foot walk, the lawsuit said.
He was then put onto a gurney but not strapped into place, the lawsuit said. As he was lifted into the ambulance, he slid off and hit his head on the ambulance’s bumper and the ground before rolling partway under the ambulance.
LaPorte stopped breathing shortly before EMTs attempted to lift him into the ambulance, as an EMT tried to untangle the tubing.
The first responders gave LaPorte CPR on the ground, without moving him back to the gurney, which is more effective for CPR, the lawsuit said. His head and neck were left under the bumper.
After about 30 minutes of CPR, LaPorte was pronounced dead. His cause of death was acute respiratory failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
