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Our Story
When accidents or sudden illness
occur, anyone can find himself in need of emergency care. Each year in the
United States, approximately one million people end up in the emergency room
unconscious or physically unable to make medical decisions.
That's exactly what happened to
Elaine Sullivan. A very active 71 year old woman, Elaine was living on her own,
when she fell at home and was taken to the hospital. Because of her injuries,
she was unable to communicate, speak or give informed consent for her own care.
Seven days later, after some of the most unbelievable negligence medical
professionals have ever seen, she died. Despite having her daughter's contact
information right on her chart, the hospital didn't bother notifying her family
that she'd been hospitalized and was in intensive care, until twelve hours
before she died, unnecessarily and alone.
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Next of Kin
Legislation
We were positive the
hospital must have broken a law by not calling me, for 6˝ days.
After all, my mother was brought into the hospital unable to
communicate, and her old chart clearly had my name on it as her daughter
and next of kin.
But through
research, we discovered that there wasn't one Illinois, California or
federal regulation that said a hospital must contact a patient's family,
even if the patient cannot
communicate or give informed consent.
In my mother's case that simple act would have saved her life.
That's when my daughter Laura and I decided to partner with
legislators to create the Next of Kin Law.
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NOKEP
When hospitals
nationwide began to ask us the best ways to perform notifications and to
comply with the new California and Illinois laws, we realized that we
needed to create a system hospitals could use to locate patient’s
emergency contact numbers and notify next of kin quickly and easily.
The Seven Steps to
Successful Notification Information Kit, is now available free of charge
to hospitals nationwide.
To download your
free copy of the Seven Steps Kit, click here.
To
read about our Seven Steps Hospital Pilot Programs coming in 2008, click
here.
To find out how to
sponsor NOKEP, or make a donation, click here.
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Filling in the
Missing Piece
After Hurricane
Katrina, the Tsunami and the London bombings, we joined forces with
other emergency specialists to bring families everywhere, tips and
information they can use in 15 minutes or less. to make all of their
emergency information accessible and ready to go at a moments notice.
To download your
free copy of the “Make your Family Safer in 15 Minutes or Less” Action
Plan, click here.
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The Next of Kin
Education Project is a Project of NOKR, Inc. a 501(c)(3) organization.
Contributions to NOKEP are tax deductible.
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