Devoted to his patients, he listed his home phone number in the phone directory making himself available to his patients at all hours. If a patient called him at 10:00 pm with a toothache, he would meet his patient at his office that night to put them at ease. He considered dentistry his calling.
An avid reader of the news, he would write editorials on dentistry. Having been called upon to fix bad dental work, he would testify in court on behalf of patients. He had the utmost respect for medical professionals. If he had an appointment with a doctor, it was called a consultation. So, it was even more of a betrayal that he would be harmed in a system that he devoted his life to, and after having committed much of his practice to the safety of his patients.
At 79, Dr. Blair chose to retire to be by his wife’s side through her battle with breast cancer. Following his wife’s death, he lived on his own for five years and was very independent. In time, he moved in with his daughter.
Dr. Blair took care of himself, saw his general doctor regularly, and knew he had to speak to his doctor when he started having trouble with severe back pain.
His doctor recommended a hospital stay for testing. Thinking he was only going to be in the hospital for a few days, Dr. Blair was admitted. What should have been a brief hospital stay turned into a nightmare.
Without informing his family, Dr. Blair was placed on a powerful cocktail of anti psychotics like Risperdal and Haldol that caused a sudden mental decline.
When his family could not awaken him and found him unresponsive, they sought answers from his doctor. The doctor said that he had developed sudden onset Alzheimer’s Disease, and moved him to a nursing home.
While at the nursing home, he was given more drugs without consent. There he fell seven times, suddenly became diabetic, and acquired a MRSA infection. His decline was rapid. After the last fall, his family was told that his heart and his kidneys were failing. He passed away just a few weeks later.
After his death, his family obtained his medical records. They discovered that his consent forms were falsified, including a do not resuscitate order Dr. Blair had never signed. His back pain turned out to be spinal stenosis a condition that can be easily treated with over the counter medication. At his funeral, his family vowed to seek answers.
They learned of California’s outdated compensation cap when they sought the advice of an attorney. They were told by multiple attorneys that they had a case, but it was not worth much due to their father’s age and retirement status. They were forced into arbitration by the nursing home. Once in arbitration, an attorney dropped any further legal action because, due to the cap, their options were limited.
When his daughter filed a complaint to the Medical Board of California, the Medical Board investigator told her the doctor would definitely face an accusation of wrongdoing brought by the Board. However, the Board negotiated a settlement with the doctor without her knowledge under which he received only a public letter of reprimand. It took 18 months to get the letter, but the Medical Board didn’t post it for another year and a half because they were waiting for the doctor to take the agreed upon classes. Usually, the classes are required to be taken within 6 months of the decision. It was a “very pitiful” public letter of reprimand, according to Dr. Blair’s daughter, and didn’t begin to address what they had done to her father. Instead of including the drugging and falsifications, the letter just stated there were medical record keeping issues, along with giving her father a diabetic drug even though he didn’t have diabetes.
As a health care professional, Dr. Blair gave hours of free care to priests and nuns. He gave his time to the Nazareth House, a boarding school for foster children, where he would provide free care to the at-risk children who resided there. His passion was health care and providing the best possible care to his patients. Yet, he was not given the best possible care in his time of need and became a victim of medical negligence.
Dr. Blair’s daughter is fighting so that no other family has to go through what hers did.