Save Sams Restaurant after death from Leukemia
My wife Sue and I have owned Sams Restaurant together since 1995. Sue and I built our business together, loving and working together for 30 years. We built a beautiful family and legacy along the journey. On December 20th at 7:30 am I watched my wife take her last breath. She has been battling Acute Monocytic Leukemia for the past two years. My wife Suhad Abughannam went into remission at Kaiser in Roseville after her first round of chemotherapy in 2019. She was rediagnosed a few months later. Her oncologists said to me we can send her to do a stem cell transplant at Stanford Hospital where she will have a 99% chance of being a “brand new woman” by the end of the year or to keep her on chemotherapy and give her 1-3 years to live.
My wife never really understood her disease, my kids and I were her eyes and ears. We were there every hospital stay, every doctors visits. Of course, we decided to send her to the stem cell transplant where we knew it wouldn’t be easy but that it would give her the best chance at a cure. She began the process of the transplant on May 25, 2020. A requirement to doing the stem cell is to move by Stanford Hospital because we were to be there for up to 90 days. We gladly moved and once my wife was discharged on the 26th of July we moved her in. On the 27th of July my wife went for her blood draws they gave us the great news that she was to be sent home soon because she was cured. We were elated to say the least. The next day on the 28th she goes for her blood draws again, the same great news was received from one doctor until a few minutes later her doctor (DR. SHIRAZ) walked in and told my wife that her leukemia was back and more aggressive and that she had 3 days to a week to live.
The same doctor who told us she was cured the day before now told us she was dying.I begged the doctor not to tell this news to my wife who was already fragile and battered from the stem cell itself. Our hope was crushed. My wife lost her hearing from the devastation. For 66 days we would ask them about her blood results everyday, and we always received good news that her transplant was a success! The doctors told us she was cured but they lied and hid from us that they had detected leukemia in my wifes blood a few weeks before. We found this news out when we called and confronted Stanford Hospital about how her Leukemia come back over night. They failed to disclose to my wife and all of us that her stem cell did not work as they kept telling us everyday but that leukemia was in fact back in her blood. They also failed to tell us that they gave my wife a donor for her transplant from someone who had a VIRUS called CMV which led to my wifes stem cell failing. She also received the BK virus which contributed to her death. They knew all the information but failed to disclose it. We would ask the doctors and nurses questions about her progress everyday that we were there with her during her transplant process.
Our spirits were crushed and our faith in the health care system withered naturally. The same day they told my wife her cancer was back they made us move out the apartment we moved into only a day earlier and they sent her home in horrible condition for us to take care of her. It was the most inhumane experience. She couldn’t move on her own or do anything for herself. Her body was full of fluid and she was beyond fragile just having underwent extreme stress on her body from the transplant. We cried and pleaded to her oncologist from Kaiser who told us that he would get her on therapy for her cancer because even he did not know that her Leukemia was back. After being released from Stanford we had to take her to the ER at Kaiser because of the condition they left her in. Amid the corona virus and the fear of passing anything onto my wife, who was immune compromised from being put on therapy to control her aggressive leukemia I had to close down my business. Her oncologist put her on therapy called Xospata, which he said could give her a chance to live. However, her immunity was so compromised that the slightest illness could kill her. I could no longer risk working as I have been her caretaker throughout this journey.
For the last 30 years of my life it has always been Sam and Sue together. I would do anything to keep her well and healthy. Unfortunately, the stem cell had left her so damaged that any chance at recovery seemed impossible. The CMV that was given to her by her donor led to many complications in her body. We were never informed that her donor had a virus, and looking at her medical records now after her stem cell she had three new additional mutations in her Leukemia. My wife was admitted to the ICU on December 2nd because of the effects of the BK virus and CMV virus given to her from the donor. They wouldn’t let us see her, and I pleaded with her oncologist and doctors on December 18th to let us see her because she was not eating or walking. Anyone who knows my wife knows she is a social butterfly and that she never felt safe in the hospital without my daughter or I. Finally after my request to her oncologist he allowed me to see her on the 18th. He also informed me that she was progressing greatly and will be sent home soon, probably that Monday the 20th. When I went to see her she couldn’t breathe. She looked like she was dying. I was confused to and heartbroken to say the least as our kids and I were expecting her to come home. I had to request for the nurse to do a chest X-ray( because they neglected to do it on their own even though she couldn’t breathe and they had her on oxygen) when the results came back her lungs were filled with fluid. The doctor said she was having total system failure and was to die soon. When I confronted the doctor about why her lungs hadn’t been checked he stated they were checked two days before. My daughter asked him to show her, and it was confirmed that her lungs were actually not checked for 11 days. Which ultimately led to them being filled with fluid.
What is devastating is that I kept asking her doctor why they didn’t take a X-ray of my wife’s lung and that her oncologists and doctors said she was getting better! She could have been saved and her doctor stated that her oncologists had met with the doctors and they discussed her death without us knowing. So they knew my wife was passing and didn’t tell us instead they told us that she was coming home. They crushed us! Then they allowed us to see my wife, I spent the night with her up until the moment she passed away. The torment we have gone though has been tremendous. To constantly believe my wife would be cured only to be lied to and have them know she was going to die the whole time is hurtful. And I have peace knowing that my wife is so longer suffering but I have no peace knowing that I couldn’t see my wife for 18 Days. They didn’t even get my wife out the bed to walk her. The bed sores on her back were horrific. She had a huge open wound on her upper back that were all nonexistent before she was admitted to the hospital.
In the midst of my wife dying, I am left with back rent due and other expenses that I have not been able to pay off. My business has been closed for almost a year because of COVID so that I can care for my wife. My wife and I have five beautiful children to help support. I have applied for but not received government assistance for my business yet. The people that own the restaurant I lease have no sympathy for what I have been battling this past year with my wife and they want their money. My family and I would deeply appreciate any help. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.