Alberta government orders review after man dies in ER while waiting for care

Prashanth Sreekumar in an undated handout photo with his wife and three children. A family friend has set up a fundraiser for Sreekumar’s family after his death in an Alberta emergency department.HO/The Canadian Press

The Alberta government has ordered a review after a 44-year-old man died of an apparent cardiac arrest while waiting in an emergency department in Edmonton earlier this week.

Minister of hospital and surgical health services Matt Jones, in a social media post, said he has directed Acute Care Alberta and Covenant Health to jointly review the circumstances and factors leading to the death of Prashanth Sreekumar at Grey Nuns Community Hospital last Monday.

Sreekumar, who was experiencing chest pain, died after allegedly waiting nearly eight hours to see a doctor at the ER.

The accountant was at his office when the chest pain began. His client drove him to the hospital, said Varinder Bhuller, a family friend, in a phone interview.

Bhullar said initial checkups didn’t show anything abnormal but his blood pressure kept climbing. Sreekumar died from an alleged cardiac arrest soon after triage.

“It was completely avoidable. That’s the sad part,” Bhuller said.

“Sometimes we think it’s God’s wish, but this time I think humans could have intervened enough to save him.”

Bhuller recalled Sreekumar as a good friend, a person who loved his family and lived an active life, often playing cricket.

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Acute Care Alberta, a new provincial health agency, said it will participate in the review and implement any recommendations, and it said the office of the chief medical examiner has begun an independent investigation.

A family friend has set up a fundraiser for Sreekumar’s family — three children aged three, 10 and 14, and his wife — to support them with ongoing needs.

(There’s) a lot of grief, a lot of sense of disbelief and frustration and they don’t know what to do,“ Bhuller said of the grieving family.

Sreekumar was the family’s sole breadwinner as his wife stayed home to look after one of their children with special needs, he added.

In a GoFundMe fundraiser, the family has called for a transparent investigation and accountability.

“We don’t know what will be the next step,” Bhuller said. “A lot of lawyers have contacted us about the legal action, but we have not decided anything.”