An Illinois abortion facility owned by a married couple with a shady history has sent three women to the hospital in less than two weeks.
Operation Rescue reported that Access Health Center in Downers Grove, Illinois, sent three women to the hospital with dangerous post-abortion hemorrhaging. The 911 records were obtained by the Pro-Life Action League. All three emergencies occurred in late December of 2023.
Owners’ history of failed inspections and a patient death
Access Health is owned by married couple Vinod and Vijay Goyal. In 1996, the state took disciplinary action against the Goyals after they were caught charging over 10 times the cost of an actual abortion procedure to insurance companies. In later years, other facilities they owned were so dangerous that they had to be shut down until the surgical instruments in the facility had been sterilized. The staff was also required to undergo mandatory training. Additionally, numerous other facilities the Goyals owned had deficiencies when inspected. An inspection from 2019, for example, had a seven-page report of violations including the report of an abortionist who failed to wash his hands between patients, even when he was about to begin a surgical abortion.
At least one patient has been killed on their watch: Melissa Heim, who underwent a surgical abortion with twilight sedation, and was then left alone in a recovery room afterward. Because she was not monitored, when she suffered cardiac and respiratory arrest it was not immediately discovered and no resuscitation measures were taken until paramedics arrived.
By then, it was too late; she had already suffered brain damage and died four days later.
Patient #1 – December 19 – No information known
The first emergency took place on December 19th, and the staffer was reluctant to provide any relevant information to the 911 dispatcher, which would have helped paramedics prepare for the emergency.
“I’m not sure,” she said when asked what happened to the patient. “A patient here for an elective abortion and I… I don’t have any information. I just know we need a transfer. Patient is stable, but I don’t know any more information. I’m sorry.”
The dispatcher pressed for more details, so the staffer placed her on hold, but still remained vague. “They just having heavy bleeding after the termination, so doctor just wants to make sure she’s OK,” she said, adding that the ambulance should come through the back, and that the patient was awake, alert, and breathing.
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Yet the computer-aided dispatch (CAD) transcript revealed that the paramedics described the emergency as a “hemorrhage/laceration;” lacerations to reproductive organs are known complications of surgical abortions.
Patient #2: December 27 – Hemorrhage
On December 27th, another woman was sent to the hospital with serious bleeding. Again, the staffer seemed to downplay the emergency.
“A patient is just having bleeding after, um, an elective abortion, and doctor wants her to be monitored in a more secure setting,” she said. “She’s stable.” The CAD transcript again described the emergency as “hemorrhage/lacerations,” though it also listed “pregnancy problem (no contractions or birth),” bringing into question whether the abortion was actually completed.
Patient #3: December 29 – Abnormal bleeding
Finally, a third woman was injured on December 29th. This time, the staffer requested police to come as well, because pro-lifers were there recording the emergency from outside. The staffer accused the pro-lifers of trespassing onto the property, but video showed they did not.
“We need two officers over here,” she said. “We are doing what we call a transport, meaning we’re transporting a patient from here to the hospital, and, uh, the protesters that normally stand out front are coming on the lawn, they are recording, and things like that. So we kinda need them to move them off the lawn, cause it’s a, it’s a privacy thing. Like they’re trying to record the patient leaving in the ambulance.”
The staffer then asked if she would send the ambulance with the police officers, stunning the dispatcher; evidently, an ambulance had not yet been requested, calling into question how the pro-lifers were recording an ambulance transfer.
“Did you want paramedics as well?” the dispatcher asked, clearly sounding surprised. The staffer replied that she needed both. Only then did the staffer give details about the actual medical emergency at hand.
“She is having a lot of abnormal bleeding,” the staffer said. “Yeah, they keep coming on the property and trying — ”
The dispatcher interrupted the staffer and continued asking questions about the patient’s medical status. Staff said she was awake, breathing, and responding normally, but admitted that she had been given a “foley,” meaning a foley balloon catheter, which is sometimes used to stop vaginal bleeding. The CAD transcript did not give any other information.
How many more women will be injured or killed before this facility is shut down?
