WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — A Palm Beach County judge has rejected a petition to order Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center to give a grievously ill Loxahatchee woman an unproven drug to help her combat COVID-19.
In a three-page order, Circuit Judge James Nutt ruled that attorneys representing the husband of 47-year-old Tamara Drock didn’t use the correct legal procedure to ask that he order the hospital to administer ivermectin, a parasite-fighting drug.
While Nutt said Ryan Drock’s attorneys could amend their lawsuit, he warned that that too could fail.
“On its face, the (husband) neither asks for nor pleads the necessary elements of a temporary injunction,” he wrote, referring to the other legal option that is available.
Still, he said, “given the gravity and urgency of this case,” he would be willing to consider a request for a temporary injunction.
Attorney Jake Huxtable instead is asking Nutt to reconsider his decision.
"The court's understanding of the issue and relief requested is incorrect and utterly misguided, respectfully," he wrote in a motion filed Monday.
He insisted Ryan Drock, as his wife’s legal representative, has the constitutional right to accept the advice of another doctor, who has offered to administer ivermectin to the unvaccinated woman, a 47-year-old teacher at Egret Lake Elementary School in West Palm Beach.
Dr. Bruce Boros, a retired Key Largo cardiologist, doesn’t have privileges at Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center, which is owned by Tenet Healthcare. Further, the drug hasn’t been approved for use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat COVID-19.
In his ruling, Nutt said the petition Huxtable filed was developed at the request of the Florida Supreme Court so disputes over life-sustaining medical treatment could be resolved quickly.
“It is not a right to demand a particular treatment. It is not a right to substitute one’s judgment as to which treatments must (be) made available by others,” he wrote. “There is no right, constitutional or otherwise, of a patient to substitute one’s judgment for a medical professional.”
Still, in a finding Hutxtable seized upon, Nutt also wrote that a person’s right to self-determination includes the ability to “accept or refuse” treatment.
In Ryan Drock’s case, he simply wants to accept the advice of a physician he trusts, Huxtable wrote.
“The patient is on death's doorstep; there is no further COVID-19 treatment protocol for (the hospital) to administer to the patient," he wrote.
Ryan Drock, he said, "is doing everything he can to give his wife a chance of survival."
No studies have shown that ivermectin is effective in treating COVID-19, according to the FDA. But after initial, small nonclinical studies showed it held some promise, it was seized on by conservative groups, who pushed for its use.
Similar lawsuits have been filed throughout the country. Judges in Delaware, New York and Ohio have refused to order hospitals to administer it.
In addition to saying that it hasn’t proven to be effective, judges have ruled that patients have no right to demand treatment that isn’t considered part of the standard of care.
However, a judge in Duval County last month ordered a Jacksonville hospital to give ivermectin to a critically ill COVID-19 patient.
In his decision, Circuit Judge Bruce Anderson wrote that the potential for harm to the patient outweighed any potential damage to the hospital. Further, he said, failure to administer ivermectin could cause “irreparable harm.”
He ordered a Jacksonville hospital to give Boros emergency privileges so he could give the drug to a critically ill woman. Her husband had requested it.
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