Pattern of Abortion Complications at Haskell Clinics Prompts Complaint

By Cheryl Sullenger

Cincinnati, Ohio, — A complaint has been filed with the State Medical Board of Ohio against late-term abortionist Martin Haskell alleging violations of the standards of patient care after an abortion patient was hospitalized last month. The complaint asks that the Board conduct a thorough review and take whatever steps are necessary to protect the public.

A recording of the 911 call placed personally by Haskell on March 28, 2012, revealed that a woman was unconscious and suffering seizures that could not be controlled while coming out of anesthesia after an abortion. The woman was transported to Bethesda Hospital, where Haskell has no admitting privileges nor does he have an agreement for a physician to care for his abortion complications.

The Ohio Department of Health was notified and immediately sent out a team of surveyors who, according to witnesses, were denied access to Haskell’s clinic until he was prepared to allow them in.

This is the second known incident of suffered by a Haskell patient involving uncontrolled seizures. On March 12, 2009, a woman suffered nearly identical complications at his Kettering clinic located near Dayton, Ohio, and was transported unconscious to Miami Valley Hospital.

Operation Rescue has documented two additional incidents of abortion complications at Haskell’s abortion clinics, one as recent as last February when an ambulance was called for an unconscious woman who was not breathing on her own after an abortion.

Listen to the call:

In an incident on March 19, 2009, a desk clerk is heard making the calls on behalf of the mother of a patient who was in labor. The mother told the clerk that her daughter was in the process of a “miscarriage.” After the clerk called for an ambulance, she placed a second call about 3 minutes later. The clerk told the dispatcher, “Apparently the baby has fallen into the toilet and the umbilical cord – um, uh – the baby’s dead.”

Listen to Call 1:

Listen to Call 2:

“These disturbing calls show a pattern of botched abortions and complications at Haskell’s abortion clinics that raise serious concerns that women’s lives are being placed at unnecessary risk,” said Cheryl Sullenger, Senior Policy Advisor for Operation Rescue and Pro-Life Nation, who filed the complaint.

“The medical board needs to take a hard look at what is going on behind the closed doors of Haskell’s clinics before one of his patients end up in the morgue, if that has not already been the case.”

Background