California mom fights to save daughter after doctors declare her brain dead
Mother fights to save daughter declared brain dead
A Southern California mother is fighting to keep her 29-year-old daughter on life support after doctors declared her brain dead following a July 6 shooting.
LOS ANGELES - A Southern California mother says she is fighting to save her 29-year-old daughter after doctors told the family she was brain dead.
Rochelle Grant says her daughter, Dejianna Lane, was shot on July 6 and taken to Los Angeles General Medical Center.
According to Grant, within 48 hours of the shooting, doctors told the family Dejianna was brain dead and encouraged them to consider organ donation.
"They kept asking me, ‘Do you think your daughter would want to live like this? She could save 29 other people,’" Grant said. "They said I was being selfish. But I know my daughter. She would fight for me like I’m fighting for her. She has two children."
Grant says she believes her daughter has shown signs of improvement and deserves more time to recover.
She also alleges the hospital stopped providing some of the treatments Dejianna had previously been receiving because doctors believed there was no chance of recovery.
"They’re not following protocol," Grant said. "Every two to three days the IV should be changed out. They had not been. They just put in a PICC line because I made such a fuss about it, saying that’s life-saving care."
Determined to continue treatment, Grant took Los Angeles General Medical Center to court.
A judge temporarily ordered the hospital to continue providing life-sustaining care while allowing the family to transfer Dejianna to another medical facility.
Grant, however, claims the transfer still has not happened.
"The reason they gave was, ‘Her insurance won’t cover it,’" Grant said. "We said we’d pay for it out of pocket. Then they said they don’t have any beds. If they didn’t have any beds, they wouldn’t have given us the number to tell the hospital to complete the transfer."
As the family continues working to move Dejianna to another hospital, Grant says she is determined to keep fighting for her daughter’s life.
"It’s not right," she said. "They took an oath to save lives. So to let one person go to save 29 other people is just not fair. It’s not fair to her."
Los Angeles General Medical Center declined to comment on the family’s allegations, citing patient privacy laws.
The next court hearing is scheduled for Aug. 4.