Quebec nurse had to clean up after husband's death in Montreal hospital
On a night she should have been mourning, a nurse from Quebec's Laurentians region says she was forced to clean up her husband after he died at a hospital in Montreal.
Isabelle Granito is now fighting to make sure other families can mourn with dignity and respect.
Jacques Richard was 52 years old when he died suddenly of a heart attack last year.
"My son contacted me. He said, 'Dad is dead.' He said, 'Come fast. There's nobody to help us," she said.
Richard was taken to the Royal Victoria Hospital, where Granito found him, an hour after his death. She said her partner was lying on a stretcher in the resuscitation room.
"His body was all covered with biological fluids, and a tube was still there, and nothing had been cleaned," she said.
Granito has worked as a nurse for 26 years and said she was shocked to see his body had not been cleaned up. When she asked for a supervisor, Granito said she was told there was no one.
"I asked him, 'Please, can you send someone to clean it up?' They say, 'Yes, sure, I will send them. You'll go do it with her.' So I changed my husband with her," she said.
That was her last memory of her husband of 23 years.
"I've been robbed. I've been robbed this moment," she said.
Jacques Richard was 52 years old when he died suddenly of a heart attack last year (Handout photo)Granito said she suffers from post-traumatic stress and at not even 50 years old, she believes her career may be over.
"I'm traumatized. I haven't been back to work, and I'm not sure I can go back as a nurse," she said.
In a statement to CTV News, a spokesperson from the McGill University Hospital Centre wrote, "We are sorry to hear that a patient or family member has had an unpleasant experience at the MUHC."
Without commenting on the specific case, the spokesperson added, "it can also happen that family members enter the room when resuscitation efforts have just finished, and inadvertently find themselves face to face with a patient who has not been cleaned."
After losing the father of her children, Granito plans to file two official complaints: one with the MUHC and another with the Quebec Order of Nurses.
"I'm fighting for people like me who had no help," she said.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Signs of Alzheimer’s were everywhere. Then his brain improved
Blood biomarkers of telltale signs of early Alzheimer’s disease in the brain of his patient, 55-year-old entrepreneur Simon Nicholls, had all but disappeared in a mere 14 months.
What we've learned so far in the Trump hush money trial and what to watch for as it wraps up
Testimony in the hush money trial of Donald Trump is set to conclude in the coming days, putting the landmark case on track for jury deliberations that will determine whether it ends in a mistrial, an acquittal — or the first-ever felony conviction of a former American president.
Sentencing trial set to begin for Florida man who executed 5 women at a bank in 2019
Zephen Xaver walked into a central Florida bank in 2019, fatally shot five women and then called police to tell them what he did. Now 12 jurors will decide whether the 27-year-old former prison guard trainee is sentenced to death or life without parole.
'How do you get hypothermia in a prison?' Records show hospitalizations among Virginia inmates
The Virginia State Police investigator seemed puzzled about what the inmate was describing: "unbearable" conditions at a prison so cold that toilet water would freeze over and inmates were repeatedly treated for hypothermia.
Helicopter carrying Iran's president suffers a 'hard landing,' state TV says without further details
A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi suffered a "hard landing" on Sunday, Iranian state television reported, without immediately elaborating.
Canadian immigration asks medical worker fleeing Gaza if he treated Hamas fighters
Lawyers are questioning Canada’s approach to screening visa applications for people in Gaza with extended family in Canada after one applicant, a medical worker, was asked whether he had treated members of Hamas.
The secret Italian lakes that most tourists don't know about
Italy has dozens of secret smaller lakes that boast superb scenery, unknown to mass tourism, where locals get together on day trips and enjoy picnics.
Flammable kids' sleepwear, salmonella-contaminated chips: Here are the recalls of this week
Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency issued recalls for various items this week, including kids' bassinets, chips, and stoves. Here's what to watch out for.
Walmart, Costco refusing to sign grocery code of conduct 'untenable': industry minister
Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne says it's 'untenable' for 'smaller players' like Walmart and Costco to delay signing on to the government- and industry-led grocery code of conduct, now that industry giant Loblaw has agreed to do so.