A New York couple experienced every parent's worst nightmare when their 21-year-old daughter was brought to a hospital last year.
Dale Alice Martin had only broken her ankle but died 14 hours after seeking treatment in Waterbury Hospital in Connecticut.
Her father, Lindsay Martin, is now suing the medical institution, claiming that Dale's death was caused by medical malpractice, the Hartford Courant reported.
'Within 14 hours of admission, providers at the hospital had administered so much pain medication that Dale stopped breathing and later died,' the lawsuit filed by lawyer Christopher Mattei of Koskoff, Koskoff & Bieder said.
'No one checked on Dale during this time. The same medications that were interfering with Dale's breathing were also sedating her.
'Dale could not even call for help as she suffocated. At 7am on April 10, a Waterbury Hospital nurse finally checked on Dale. It was far too late. Her heart had stopped beating.'
When brought to the hospital, neither Dale nor her parents knew that she was headed for an institution struggling with adequate patient care capacities allegedly caused by the hospital's former private equity owner.
Waterbury Hospital was owned by California-based Prospect Medical Holdings, which filed for bankruptcy three months before Dale passed away.
Dale Alice Martin, 21, died after seeking treatment in Waterbury Hospital for her broken ankle
Her father, Lindsay Martin, filed a lawsuit accusing the hospital of wrongfully giving his daughter too much medication until she suffocated
Waterbury Hospital in Connecticut was owned by private equity firm Prospect Medical
Dale's father explained that he was unaware that the hospital 'was under investigation where nurses allegedly were buying food for patients, where the level of funding was so constrained that the hospital may not have been able to function properly.'
Prospect Medical Holdings had for years squeezed out profits from the three hospitals it owned, without considering the consequences of staffing shortages, old equipment and lack of financial puffer.
'We will obviously learn more about the extent to which Prospect's mismanagement of Waterbury Hospital contributed to the specific circumstances on the night that Dale died,' Mattei, the family's attorney, said.
'But what we expect to find is that this was a hospital that was largely operating on fumes as a result of Prospect dismantling infrastructure within the hospital, reducing staff, training, and finding every way possible to extract value out of the hospital in a way that jeopardized care.'
Prospect is no longer in charge of the hospital, which is now owned by UConn Health.
Private equity-owned hospitals have drawn controversy as studies found a higher number of falls, infections and deaths in medical institutions owned by such firms.
A recent report published in the Annals of Internal Medicine found a 13 percent increase in patient deaths in the emergency rooms of private equity healthcare institutions.
US Senator Chris Murphy from Connecticut released a report in the summer after Dale's death which found that Prospect Medical 'employed a "buy, strip, flip" strategy on which they sold off assets while gutting staff.'
Prospect Medical Holdings is accused of squeezing profit out of the hospital leading to the medical institution being short of staff, finances and adequate medical equipment
Lindsay Martin (left) said: 'Within 14 hours of admission, providers at the hospital had administered so much pain medication that Dale stopped breathing and later died'
The undergraduate student of Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas reportedly also gave piano lessons disadvantaged children
Murphy even proposed a bill with Congresswoman Mary Gay Scanlon of Pennsylvania to prevent private equity firms from owning hospitals and nursing homes.
For Dale's parents, these policies came too late.
After she was declared brain dead, medical staff tried to bring the woman back to life - without success.
'For three days, we set vigil in her hospital room, listening to the beeping of the monitors and seeing the machines keep her lungs and heart moving, waiting for the expiration of the 72 hours,' her father told the Hartford Courant.
'And in that time, you know, we kept asking: "How did this happen?"'
Doctors turned off the ventilator that the 21-year-old was hooked up to on April 13.
'It’s incredibly difficult to wrap your head around how this can happen in a hospital that’s supposed to be a house of healing,' her father said.
Dale was an undergraduate student at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas but taking a sabbatical to do farm work in Bethlehem.
She was also volunteering as a music teacher for disadvantaged children.
The Daily Mail contacted Waterbury Hospital for comment.