Underwent spinal surgery, died from skin infection; Know the tragic story of Steve Schwarz

Have you come across stories of wrong treatments that have led to unforeseen fatalities? If you haven’t, this article might shock you.

What happened?

As the Daily Mail reported, Steve Schwarz, 67, hailing from a family residing in Iowa, underwent spinal surgery in March 2020 to treat back pain. Although the surgery went without any fuss, two months later, Schwarz returned to the hospital with red swollen skin.
Doctors diagnosed him with MRSA, or methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus. They prescribed him the powerful antibiotic doxycycline, which is used to kill the bacteria, and discharged him to an inpatient care home with instructions for him to keep receiving doses - typically given via injection - for two to three months.

How, as the family of Schwarz claims, his doctor at the home, Dr Michelle Sprengelmeyer at Cedar Manor in Iowa, did not follow the instructions and discontinued his medication — allowing Schwarz's infection to spread and him to rapidly deteriorate.

When Schwarz was rushed back to the hospital three weeks later, doctors were shocked by how his infection had progressed. They contacted the care home and realized he had not received his medication. He was moved to hospice care at the hospital but died four days later on June 22, 2020.

The Schwarz family, after Steve’s death, is blaming doctors for the death of their father after they say his medical team failed to give him life-saving antibiotics.

The aftermath:

Steve Schwarz’s case was revealed late last year after his daughter, Heather Barrett, sued the doctors over his treatment. Although it was not ruled that Schwarz's death was directly caused by not getting doxycycline, a jury awarded her $1.65million in damages because her father did not receive the care he needed.

Mr Schwarz's daughter described her father as 'thriving' when he first arrived at the care home and expected him to be home within two weeks. But instead, his condition began to decline rapidly.

Barrett said, while talking to local media outlet KWWL.com, “When he was finally transferred [to the hospital], the infectious disease experts at the University of Iowa Hospitals were shocked that they had discontinued his antibiotic and that no one had followed up on his MRSA diagnosis. We didn't learn about it until that moment and literally I think it was an hour or two later... my dad was placed on hospice care.'

She also added in a release, “It’s difficult to reason that a common infection took [my dad] down. He rode ATVs, hopped in his car for cross-country road trips to surprise us [in California]. He was a strong, active man who was just starting to enjoy his retirement. We thought he was getting the care he needed after surgery. It didn’t make sense that he wasn’t improving. It was too late when we discovered the infection wasn’t being treated with antibiotics. It was awful, my dad deserved better care.”

Barrett’s lawyer, Anthony Bribriesco from Bribriesco Law Firm, mentioned, “We are pleased that the jury held Dr Sprengelmeyer accountable. In preparing for this case, we learned that the overall success rate for treatment of spinal infection involving hardware with suppressive antibiotics is nearly 80 percent. A simple, well-known treatment of antibiotics would have saved Steve's life.”

What is MRSA?

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a group of gram-positive bacteria that are genetically distinct from other strains of Staphylococcus aureus. MRSA is responsible for several difficult-to-treat infections in humans.

It is a serious bacterial infection that plagues many hospitals because of the heavy use of antibiotics and vulnerable patients there, and it is resistant to many antibiotics that infect about 80,000 Americans a year. It kills about 11,000 Americans every year, or just over one in eight who are infected. It caused more than 100,000 deaths worldwide attributable to antimicrobial resistance in 2019.

However, the infection can be cleared with careful monitoring and the use of powerful antibiotics. Studies suggest about 80% of patients treated for MRSA after spinal surgery survive.

Symptoms often start as a swollen, red, and painful wound that is warm and painful to the touch and is accompanied by a fever.

Over time, if MRSA is not treated, the bacteria can spread to the bloodstream and reach vital organs like the heart, where it can cause endocarditis — when the heart's lining and valves become inflamed.

It can also trigger sepsis, a life-threatening condition where the immune system over-reacts to an infection and causes organs to shut down.