Staffing shortages at a hospital in Rhode Island forced providers to turn away a disabled Marine veteran who was sent there for an MRI scan, according to a September 28 report published on the website of WPRI television.
The report said that in August, Joe Correia was referred to Rhode Island Hospital for an MRI scan by physicians at a long-term care facility in East Providence, who suspected he may have sustained a stroke. Correia is an amputee and diabetic, and he was recently diagnosed with Epstein-Barr virus.
But Correia was sent back to the long-term care facility 12 hours later without having received the MRI scan. Correia's wife told WPRI that hospital staffers said they were too busy to perform the scan.
The report notes that Rhode Island has one of the worst shortages of healthcare staff in the U.S., with six of the 12 hospitals in the state reporting a critical shortage. A spokesperson for the operator of Rhode Island Hospital acknowledged the personnel shortages and noted that they had resulted in backups in the hospital's emergency department.
