02x13 - The Desperate Crossing

[bunniefuu]

[music playing]

NARRATOR A disabled woman is found dead in broad daylight

in the middle of a public park.

A lot of people could have att*cked her.

She can't fight back very easily.

NARRATOR Police suspect foul play,

and the victim's mother faces her worst fear.

Some evil person had seen perhaps

what they thought was a helpless girl in a wheelchair.

NARRATOR Can Dr. G discover who or what k*lled this woman

and bring some peace to a bereaved mother?

Then a man dies suddenly and unexpectedly

after complaining of what appear to be

non-life threatening ailments.

He had sore throat and neck pain.

NARRATOR But the autopsy soon revealed

something far more frightening deep inside his body.

Look at that.

It's so bad you can just squeeze the puss out

of the layers of the muscle.

This is a sore throat from hell.

NARRATOR Altered lives, baffling medical mysteries,

shocking revelations.

These are the everyday cases of "Dr G Medical Examiner."

[music playing]

Coming through with laundry.

NARRATOR It's another routine morning for the staff

at Orlando's District morgue.

But for a group of visiting cadets

from the Orlando Police Department,

it's a day they'll never forget.

So what I'm doing is taking the chest plate off.

NARRATOR As part of their training,

the group is observing an autopsy for the first time.

You can see there's a large part of his brain missing

on this right left side.

Is that part of the b*llet?

DR. G Yeah.

There's pieces of b*llet with soot on it

driven way into his brain.

And we still have lost one.

But he came back.

NARRATOR When the autopsy is over,

some students are greatly enlightened.

Just makes me more prepared to get out there

and do what I need to do.

NARRATOR While others are a bit shaken.

WOMAN The smell is pretty bad.

I figured if I didn't put my hand in front of my face,

I definitely would have been sick.

NARRATOR All agree that one autopsy is enough for one day,

but for Dr. G another case awaits.

[music playing]

Less than hours ago, a -year-old disabled woman

was found dead in broad daylight near her home.

Well, my investigators reporting to me

that this woman was found in a park face down in the sand

by three girls.

They know who she is.

They find her face down and they run off to get an adult.

NARRATOR According to the report,

the police arrived shortly afterward

and discover a troubling sight, a young woman lying dead

in the open field of a small public park,

over feet from what appears to be her wheelchair.

DR. G And she's kind of face down in the sand,

a little bit of blood on her face.

NARRATOR Neighbors familiar with the victim

tell police that her name is Ginny Ellis,

and that she is quadriplegic.

DR. G See, I've got some records from .

Final injury, she had a vertebral repair

about six years ago.

Loss of control in her vehicle.

NARRATOR Then police noticed something

disturbing on the ground.

DR. G Uh, some drag marks, some possible hand marks

were in the area of the sand.

NARRATOR The trail leads feet

across the park to Ginny's wheelchair,

which sits submerged in several inches of sand.

A few yards away they discover a dog leash.

The drag marks and the nature of the woman's disability

immediately raise a troubling question.

How could a quadriplegic have ended up nearly feet away

from her wheelchair?

It really didn't make a lot of sense

why she's way in the corner of a park with her wheelchair

stuck in the sand.

NARRATOR However, one fact seems clear so far.

Well, if she's truly quadriplegic

she's not crawling.

But, uh, how did she get away from

her wheelchair if she's-- if she's truly quadriplegic?

A lot of unanswered questions here.

NARRATOR And if Ginny wasn't crawling,

someone must have dragged her.

DR. G And it's suspicious because we have

a young woman who couldn't defend herself found,

uh, face down in the sand.
[ … ]

And we don't know what really happened to her.

NARRATOR Then as the police are wrapping up

their on-site investigation, a woman

rushes to the scene in a panic.

Her name is Barbara Ellis, and she identifies

herself as the victim's mother.

BARBARA ELLIS I kind of fell apart.

Uh, still couldn't believe it.

They wouldn't-- they wouldn't let me go to her.

I couldn't believe what they were saying.

It wasn't sinking in, and she--

she can't be dead.

NARRATOR Ginny's mother informs morgue field investigators

that she was out at an appointment earlier in the day,

and that during that time, Ginny probably

took her dog Prince for a walk.

Ginny's mother also tells them that when she returned home,

Prince was waiting at the door without Ginny.

BARBARA ELLIS Soon at prince came home,

I should have gone looking for her then.

They say no.

They say you can't blame yourself, but I do.

NARRATOR But as questions mount,

another disturbing possibility emerges.

BARBARA ELLIS All I could think is that some evil person had

seen what they thought was a helpless girl in a wheelchair

and, um, was going to have some fun.

Or did somebody drag her?

Did somebody put her face down in the sand?

Did somebody b*at her?

What's going on here?

NARRATOR Upon finishing the investigators report,

Dr. G's mission is clear.

Determine if wheelchair bound Ginny Ellis was the victim

of cold blooded m*rder.

After Ginny's body is weighed and photographed,

Dr. G takes her first close look at the outside of the body.

Her priority at this stage is to search for signs

indicating that Ginny had been assaulted

and dragged along the ground.

DR. G When I first look at the body,

I'm taking with how much sand is still on her.

In her face, in her hair, even in the eye,

the conjunctivae of the eye.

You look at her nostrils.

They're filled with sand.

There's sand in her mouth, deep in her mouth.

She's got certainly abrasions down, uh,

the forearm on the elbow.

She's got abrasion on the, uh-- the other elbow.

She's got a little bit of, uh, some superficial things

on her knee.

NARRATOR To the untrained eye, the sand and injury patterns

could suggest that Ginny was dragged across the park,

but Dr. G immediately notices several subtle inconsistencies

in the wound patterns.

She's got a lot of dirt on her, on her front, some minor--

more abrasions on her knees, but real bad abrasions on

her elbows, um, on her forearm.

NARRATOR Usually victims who are dragged

are held by the arms and sustain scrapes to their backs,

not their knees and elbows.

The finding suggests something completely unexpected.

Ginny wasn't dragged by another person.

She may in fact have dragged herself away

from the wheelchair under her own power.

DR. G She was probably crawling.

She's the one doing the moving, not somebody dragging her.

NARRATOR But how could a quadriplegic

manage to drag herself at all, let alone feet?

I'll talk to her mom and see really

what she can do with her arms, if she's ever crawled before.

Boy, it sounds hard to believe, but we'll see.

NARRATOR An investigator calls Ginny's mother who

offers a possible explanation.

They really question I guess her, uh, family.

She does have some use of her--

one of her arms and maybe a little bit

of use of the other arm.

NARRATOR But even if Ginny did manage

to drag herself feet with her one functioning arm,

the question is why.

What was she trying to crawl to get away from?

NARRATOR Coming up next, Dr. G discovers

what could be Ginny's k*ller.

Lo and behold, when we look at the trachea

and the larynx that's packed with sand,

there is no way air can come down.

NARRATOR When "Dr. G Medical Examiner" continues.

[music playing]

She is another candidate.

She's quadriplegic.

NARRATOR Dr. G makes the standard Y incision

on the body of quadriplegic Ginny Ellis,

revealing her internal organs.

She's got osteoporosis just because of her immobilization.

NARRATOR Less than hours earlier,

police discovered Ginny's lifeless body

sprawled face down in a sandy area of a public park.

Her wheelchair was found nearly feet
[ … ]

from the body, evidence that she could

be the victim of foul play.

DR. G We don't know what happened to her.

Why is she face down in the middle of the park

and her wheelchair's at the other end of the park

feet away?

NARRATOR What Dr. G does know from the external exam

is that Ginny's pattern of injury

suggests she wasn't dragged.

Something caused her to not stay at that wheelchair.

I mean she's trying to crawl so somebody can see her,

but she didn't want to stay where her wheelchair got stuck.

NARRATOR Now Dr. G must not only find out if Ginny was

trying to escape an intruder.

She must also explain how a partial quadriplegic

could have carried out such a desperate act.

According to those who knew her best,

she possessed one personal attribute that could explain

much, an indomitable spirit.

Jenny Ellis' inspiring story began six years earlier

when a routine trip to work resulted

in a life altering tragedy.

She went and got in her car and didn't put her belt on,

thinking that just a couple of miles down the road

there was no need.

She hit the curb with a tire just the wrong way.

It bounced up off the curb and she lost control, hit a tree

and flipped.

She was thrown from the car.

NARRATOR Ginny survived the initial trauma,

but the doctor's prognosis was grim.

BARBARA ELLIS They had told me she won't have any movement

in her legs or her arms and will probably

have a problem breathing.

NARRATOR Within months, Ginny was broke

and her health insurance depleted,

but Ginny was no ordinary accident victim.

BARBARA ELLIS There's Ginny standing.

NARRATOR After months of agonizing practice,

she regained limited yet crucial use of her right and left arm.

BARBARA ELLIS She knew that through practice she

could do more, and her arm was getting stronger

and she could move her fingers better.

And when it first happened she just screamed out to all,

come-- come see.

Come see.

She said no way.

I'm not going to go live in a nursing home.

I'm not going to just lie here and take it.

Yeah.

I'll learn how to eat.

I'll learn how to work.

I'll learn how to move.

If that's what I have to do, I'll learn how to do it.

And she did.

Her motivation was just phenomenal.

NARRATOR Besides her mother, Ginny's closest companion

became her dog, Prince Valient.

BARBARA ELLIS He would snuggle up in her lap

while she was in the wheelchair.

She loved this little puppy, and this little puppy loved her.

NARRATOR It's clear to Dr. G now

that Ginny possessed the physical strength

and resolve to drag her body across the Orlando park,

but what motivated the act remains a mystery.

She's no weakling, that's for sure.

Maybe her body had given out, but I think

she had a very strong spirit.

NARRATOR Dr. G is now ready to examine the internal organs.

We certainly see evidence of old trauma.

We see old contusions of the brain,

uh, that are now discolored and shrunken, uh, where she had

some significant brain trauma.

NARRATOR But none of these afflictions

is life threatening.

Some are the result of her car crash, the remainder

from ailments that commonly plague the nation's

, quadriplegics.

But when Dr. G examines Ginny's lungs,

she discovers an abnormality that

definitely did occur in the moments before her death.

Lo and behold, when we cut the bronchus, I see sandy mucus,

and the sandy mucus extends all the way into the deep parts

of the lung.

I mean she's got sand deep in her lungs.

See, look at her lungs.

They're just filled with it.

NARRATOR Dr. G follows the trail of compacted sand

through Ginny's respiratory system.

And then when I cut and look at the trachea and the larynx,

that's packed with sand.

There is no way air can come down.

NARRATOR Dr. G has found the cause of Ginny Ellis' death.

She suffocated from breathing in a large amount of sand.

The finding leaves Dr. G with a daunting question.

I know at that point she suffocated,

but I don't know exactly why she's inhaling that sand.

Somebody could be forcing her head down.

NARRATOR To prove Ginny was m*rder*d,

Dr. G must find evidence of physical trauma.
[ … ]

So far, the autopsy has revealed none,

but there is one last place to look for answers.

Uh, we're never going to know for sure that she

doesn't have a trauma until we open up her head

and look in her brain.

NARRATOR It doesn't take long to find answers.

I see absolutely nothing wrong so far.

There is no trauma to her skull.

And I'm-- look, there's obviously

no trauma to the brain that I can see now.

NARRATOR In short, Dr. G can find no evidence to suggest

that Ginny was m*rder*d.

There was really no evidence that she was beaten at all.

Um, we've looked completely on her body.

She doesn't have any internal trauma and nothing in her head.

And that was the last thing I was waiting for,

to make sure there wasn't hidden trauma in her brain and head.

And there isn't any.

NARRATOR But this discovery only deepens the mystery.

If she wasn't assaulted, what would compel Ginny to crawl

yards across the park?

Unless an additional finding reveals something new,

no one may ever know for sure what happened

to Ginny in her final moments.

Through the autopsy, we had hoped

to find out what happened, how this vibrant young woman,

this--

so full of life.

How could she just be dead on a Friday afternoon?

[music playing]

NARRATOR Coming up next, Dr. G receives

help from outside the morgue that might

cr*ck the case of Ginny Ellis.

DR. G Their spinal cord doctor gave me

a call in the morgue to tip me off

that she did have something you only see in spinal cord

injured patients.

NARRATOR When "Dr. G Medical Examiner" continues.

[music playing]

The autopsy of quadriplegic Ginny Ellis

is coming to a close as more techs

prepare for their next case.

The procedure has revealed that Ginny suffocated in the sand

after crawling feet from her wheelchair.

But because Dr. G found no evidence to support foul play,

she may never be able to tell the victim's mother

what happened to Ginny, a result that

could leave her family holding a heavy emotional burden.

Maybe I could have prevented what had happened.

I don't know.

They say no.

They say you can't blame yourself, but I do.

[music playing]

NARRATOR But just as Dr. G is about to move on

to her next case, she gets a call

from one of Ginny's physicians, a call that

will break the case wide open.

She had a, uh, doctor who'd heard about her death,

her spinal cord doctor, and gave me a call in the morgue

to tip me off that she did have, uh, autonomic dysreflexia.

NARRATOR Autonomic dysreflexia, a dangerous syndrome

that affects the part of the nervous system regulating

the involuntary actions of organs and blood vessels

is suffered only by victims of spinal cord injuries.

When a healthy body sustains minor trauma,

such as excessive heat or abrasions,

distress signals are sent up through the autonomic

nervous system to the brain.

Messages are then sent back down telling

organs and blood vessels how to respond

proportionately to the injury.

But in spinal cord victims like Ginny,

crucial messages to and from the brain

are blocked because of the damaged spinal cord,

which in turn cause organs and vessels

to overreact to minor trauma.

DR. G And it causes the signal to go up your spinal cord,

but it can't go up the spinal cord past where your lesion is,

so it never reaches your brain.

NARRATOR Unchecked, the condition causes blood pressure

to rise and the heart rate to fall,

which can lead to fainting, stroke, or even death.

For Ginny, autonomic dysreflexia was

a constant thr*at, especially when it came to heat.

Her body temperature was no--

no longer regulated properly.

Her skin would take on whatever the outside temperature was.

If it was warm outside, her whole body would raise up.

And it was just something that--

that she learned very early on to be aware of.

NARRATOR Finally, all the pieces of the puzzle

are falling into place.

The wheelchair stuck in the sand,

a desperate self-imposed journey across the park,

and the autonomic dysreflexia.

Ginny, a woman who fiercely embraced life,

knew she had to get out of the sun or die trying.

It was probably getting very hot for her.

I think she wanted to get in the shade.

Nobody was listening to her yell.
[ … ]

She made just that Herculean effort to get into that shade

and to move in an area where somebody saw her.

NARRATOR With all of the pieces of the puzzle in place,

Dr. G can now determine what happened to Ginny

on the day of her tragic death.

[music playing]

It's a degree August day and Ginny is walking her dog.

In the semi enclosed sun drenched part of the park,

Ginny for reasons unknown leaves the safety

of the cement pathway.

And somehow her wheelchair got stuck in the sand.

She apparently tried to go forward and back

and forward and back.

Just kind of dug her wheels deeper into the sand

so that her wheelchair was stuck solid in the sand--

sandy dirt of the park.

NARRATOR After struggling in vain to get back

onto the pavement, Ginny most likely

tries to get the attention of anyone

in the heavily populated suburban neighborhood,

but there is a problem.

DR. G Florida, a lot of people, uh, stay

indoors when it gets that hot.

Probably the air conditioners were running.

The windows would be all closed.

Ginny had a very strong powerful voice, and knowing Ginny,

she hollered her head off calling for help.

But because of the-- the air conditioners,

windows sealed up tight, no one heard her.

NARRATOR After an undetermined period of time

and realizing that the heat will dangerously aggravate

her autonomic dysreflexia Ginny makes

a brave and desperate choice.

Knowing Ginny and her determination

used up probably all her water.

She decided that she would, uh, get help herself.

DR. G But it was probably getting very hot for her.

I think she wanted to get in the shade.

Nobody was listening to her yell.

I think she thought that she was gonna die either way.

She wanted to take her life in her own hands

and try to save herself instead of just dying in the wheelchair

stuck in the corner.

[music playing]

NARRATOR During Ginny's heroic bid for safety,

she drags her body across the sand,

causing abrasions to her knees and elbows.

The minor trauma and the excessive heat

trigger her autonomic dysreflexia.

Distress signals traveling to and from the brain

are disrupted at her old spinal cord injury, then her organs

and blood vessels thinking they are suffering

from severe trauma overreact, causing her heart

rate to plummet and her blood pressure

to rise out of control.

Somehow she manages to reach the protective shade of a tree,

but it is too late.

Her blood pressure is too high and she passes out.

DR. G She collapses suddenly face down in the sand

and starts inhaling the sand.

It fills up her windpipe and into her lungs

and then she suffocates.

NARRATOR Sandy mucus begins to build up in Ginny's lungs

until she can no longer breathe.

With no one there to help, she dies.

[music playing]

Dr. G now has the necessary medical answers

to complete the official autopsy report of Ginny Ellis.

But one important question remains.

What led the normally cautious woman to steer her wheelchair

from the concrete path where it could get

caught in the treacherous sand?

As it turns out, it wasn't carelessness

that led to the deadly dilemma.

Most likely it was love and devotion

to one of her best friends, her dog Prince Valient.

What I now have come to understand

is that perhaps Prince had gotten loose from her

and had run into the park.

DR. G And it appears that she probably was chasing the dog.

There'd be no other reason for her to be back there.

NARRATOR But when she couldn't get Prince to come to her,

she decided to go after him.

She doesn't trap her dog, but her--

her wheelchair gets trapped in the sand and she can't get out.

NARRATOR When the final autopsy results come in,

they bring some comfort to Ginny's mother.

BARBARA ELLIS When Dr. G gave me the autopsy results,

the reasons for Ginny's death, she made it

a point that I understood that Jenny didn't suffer,

that it was a--

a peaceful death.

There wasn't any struggle.

There wasn't any contortions in her face.

I was relieved that her last moments

weren't of a violent nature, no violent end.

It's become very important for me to know this

because I have a tendency, even now I'm of guilt,

why-- why didn't I go out looking earlier?

Why didn't I find her?
[ … ]

Why wasn't I there sooner?

[music playing]

NARRATOR Coming up next, could a run of the mill infection

turn into this?

It's nasty looking.

It's so bad you can just squeeze the puss out

of the layers of the muscle.

NARRATOR When "Dr. G Medical Examiner" continues.

[music playing]

Oh my god.

WOMAN I know.

NARRATOR For thousands of morgue professionals

throughout the nation, the grisly business

of death and autopsy procedure is simply business as usual.

It's just like liquid butter.

WOMAN That is just less than a while.

DR. G Less than a while is right.

NARRATOR Heart att*cks, embolisms, homicides

and accidents rarely raise an eyebrow,

but occasionally a seemingly routine case comes along

that can by the end of an autopsy

surprise even the most experienced professional,

such as the case of this -year-old Victor Baca,

a man who d*ed while being rushed to an Orlando

hospital hours ago.

[music playing]

The morgue investigators report tells a tragic

yet all too common story.

According to the victim's family,

Victor was in relatively good health until three days ago

when suddenly something went wrong.

DR. G But he's been complaining of back pain,

shoulder pain and some throat pain,

and he hasn't been going to work.

And then he finally says, you know,

I really need to see somebody.

Family was gonna take him to go see somebody and he collapses.

NARRATOR Victor's son immediately calls

and an ambulance rushes him to a nearby hospital.

But they are too late.

Victor is pronounced dead on arrival.

No one from EMS or the hospital can

offer the family an explanation as to what

caused Victor's sudden death.

They're not gonna start running tests on a dead man.

But once they stop coding you and they pronounce you dead,

that's our jurisdiction.

They can't go any further.

So we'll-- we'll Polaroid that.

Maybe it'll be easier for the family to look at that.

[clicking of camera]

As Dr. G finishes reading through the report,

she discovers something significant

in Victor's medical history.

We also, uh, got some information

that he was diabetic and he is poorly controlled.

He takes insulin.

He doesn't take very good care of himself.

NARRATOR But because Victor d*ed suddenly while suffering

from back and shoulder pain, symptoms

not typically associated with diabetes,

she suspects another deadly disease

often caused by diabetes.

People who are diabetic have a marked increased

incidence of atherosclerotic disease,

plaque buildup in their heart.

NARRATOR One out of every five deaths in the US

is attributed to heart att*cks, making

it America's number one k*ller.

So there's a real good chance this could

just be a routine heart att*ck.

[music playing]

But he looks otherwise healthy guy.

I don't know.

We'll have to see, and then we'll get--

get Sandy to show me his back here.

NARRATOR When Dr. G gets her first look

at the outside of the body, everything seems normal.

He's got very symmetrical legs.

Really there's not much on him.

NARRATOR Until she notices something on Victor's neck.

He's got some slight greening discoloration.

It looks like-- like almost early decomp

right under the skin here.

NARRATOR Green skin is typically

associated with decomposition, which strikes Dr. G as odd.

What's really interesting here is that we supposedly got him

fresh from the emergency room.

But typically where we first start seeing greening

discoloration, it's basically the-- the early decompositional

changes.

NARRATOR Could this mysterious abnormality

have anything to do with Dr. G's heart att*ck theory?

Finding an explanation will have to wait until Dr.

G can look inside his body.

He's not using the standard Dr. G clippers.

NARRATOR Once Dr. G performs the Y incision,

she can start examining Victor's internal organs.

Highest on our list is--

is gonna be heart.
[ … ]

NARRATOR But when she opens the rib cage,

she discovers something startling.

I see a lot of infection in the-- what we call

the anterior mediastinum, which is the space

underneath your breastbone.

We're ready, right?

WOMAN We're ready to go.

NARRATOR The troubling findings suggest that Victor had

a terrible infection teeming inside his body

at the time of his death.

But as she examines the immediate chest area,

she cannot detect its source.

For the time being, Dr. G decided

to focus on the organ she still believes

to be the most likely k*ller.

Guess we're gonna go for the heart I think.

what is it?

and, uh--

WOMAN No.

. - Oh.

.

Woo.

That's big.

NARRATOR When she dissects the coronary arteries,

the main vessels supplying blood to the heart,

she makes a grim yet not unexpected discovery.

His heart was really bad.

It was bad enough that it could have k*lled him at any time.

He had-- one of his coronary arteries were % occluded.

Another's %, another's %.

NARRATOR Only minutes into the autopsy,

all the pieces seem to fit.

A diabetic man complaining of shoulder and back pains

die suddenly and unexpectedly.

His heart is hopelessly diseased.

Victor Baca has apparently succumb to America's most

common k*ller.

For some forensic pathologists, a clear finding

like this effectively closes a case,

but for Dr. G something isn't adding up.

We certainly have a hypothesis on this case.

Very bad coronary artery disease, but then here I've

got this greening discoloration plus a history of a sore throat

and an infection.

There was an infection in his chest-- in the mid portion

of his chest.

NARRATOR Could a common sore throat have anything

to do with Victor Baca's death?

Coming up next, Dr. G discovers something

she's rarely seen in years of practicing forensic pathology.

It's nasty looking.

You could just touch it and-- and express the pus coming out.

NARRATOR When "Dr. G Medical Examiner" continues.

[music playing]

Dr. G continues the dissection of Victor Baca's

diseased heart, taking sections for later evaluation

under a microscope.

The -year-old d*ed less than hours earlier,

after complaining of severe back and shoulder

pain and a bad sore throat.

The discovery of blocked coronary arteries, one of which

was % occluded, suggests that he succumbed

to a sudden heart att*ck.

Inclusion by the heart is that heart is bad enough

to have caused his death.

NARRATOR But questions remain about several large findings

made earlier in the autopsy.

DR. G We have this greening discoloration of the neck,

which is a little bit suspicious and he got an anterior

mediastinitis, which is an infection

of the part of the mediastinum, which is

the mid portion of the chest.

It's very calcified.

NARRATOR As Dr. G is wrapping up the heart dissection,

something grabs her attention.

While examining heart tissue that is normally nourished

by the blocked coronary artery, she

notices that it is not damaged or dead,

as it should be in a place where no blood was flowing.

She knows this could only mean one thing.

What happens when you get % occluded is

your body makes what's called collaterals

or smaller blood vessels get--

grow to compensate sometimes for that.

NARRATOR Collaterals are one of the heart's most

ingenious defense mechanisms.

When a coronary artery becomes completely blocked over time,

tiny blood vessels grow, bypassing the artery

and allowing life giving blood to flow around the clot

and into the heart.

So even in and of itself, just one coronary artery with %

won't necessarily k*ll you because your body can

compensate for that somewhat.

NARRATOR The finding changes everything.

Since Victor's heart was likely functioning with the help

of collaterals, it now appears that something

other than a heart att*ck might have k*lled him after all.

And Dr. G has a hunch where to look next.

But I couldn't wait to open him up and figure out

what was going on in his neck.
[ … ]

NARRATOR Dr. G starts by we examining

the infection she discovered earlier

under Victor's chest plate.

It's nasty looking.

It's gone, uh, into the mediastinum,

which is the front inside part of the chest.

Uh, it-- it's so bad you can just squeeze the puss out

of the layers of the muscle.

NARRATOR The fetid infection seems to lead directly

to Victor's neck, the same area that

showed signs of green discoloring

in the external exam.

It appears to be going right up to his jaw.

It's around his, uh, submandibular gland.

The-- the parotid gland looks OK.

But, uh, this infection appears to be going right to the jaw.

So he basically putting it together

had an abscess of his jaw.

NARRATOR It is now clear that in addition to severe heart

problems, Victor suffered from an extremely dangerous type

of infection that began as an abscess,

a cavity containing pus surrounded by inflamed tissue.

The combination of the abscess and mediastinitis

is also something that Dr. G rarely if ever sees.

And she still has no idea how Victor could have developed

such an unusual condition.

I've never seen this before.

NARRATOR Coming up next, Dr. G calls

on an infectious disease specialist

to try to figure out what k*lled Victor Baca.

Our mouths are full of all kinds of different bacteria.

It's only when they gain access to places they shouldn't

be that they result in death.

NARRATOR When "Dr. G Medical Examiner" continues.

[music playing]

Dr. Mark Wallace, an infectious disease specialist

looks over Dr. G's unusual findings

in the perplexing case of Victor Baca.

So Dr. G called me about this case

because he was very unusual, and, uh, she often calls me

about interesting infections.

NARRATOR In autopsy, Dr. G has just

discovered that in addition to severe heart disease,

Victor's body was teeming with virulent infections

in his jaw and chest.

He had an infection that started in his jaw that then

dissected down into the layers of his neck

and actually went into the chest cavity

and the anterior mediastinum right under the breast bone.

NARRATOR Now after examining all of Dr. G's findings,

Dr. Wallace is ready to weigh in.

Infections of the, um, uh, face

and the head and neck, uh, can progress

down into the mediastinum.

NARRATOR Dr. Wallace and Dr. G both believe all the evidence

proves conclusively that a bacterial infection originated

in Victor's mouth, shockingly from the most

ordinary of health problems.

MARK WALLACE Some of these infections

might arise from the-- a tooth infection or an abscess.

Our mouths are full of all kinds of different bacteria.

And so it's only when they, uh, gain access to places

they shouldn't be, sterile sites off in the jaw and the neck,

that they cause these sorts of problems.

NARRATOR In other words, a common tooth infection

probably migrated into the surrounding bone

and tissue, causing an abscess.

By the time Victor sought medical attention,

bacteria had literally begun to poison his entire system.

DR. G He definitely d*ed of an infection that

spread from his mandible down his neck

and into the mediastinum and into his blood.

NARRATOR But there's one problem with their theory.

In the modern era it's very unusual to see a mediastinal

infection that starts in the-- in the-- in the face

or the neck.

NARRATOR And there's a simple reason why.

People have a lot of symptoms from these.

They have considerable pain and usually fevers and chills

and so on, and they seek medical care quickly.

NARRATOR Is it possible that Victor simply

refused to acknowledge that he was sick?

Dr. G believes she knows the answer

and can now replay the series of events that led to Victor

Baca's unusual demise.

Weeks before his death, Victor notices a pain in his left jaw,

most likely the result of a bad toothache.

The pain increases, but inexplicably he decides

to avoid medical attention.

Meanwhile, inside his heart, one of his coronary arteries

is % blocked due in part to his diabetes.

Remarkably, thanks to the growth of collaterals,

tiny defensive capillaries that carry

blood around the blockage, this does not k*ll him.

Instead a large abscess forms in his jaw and begins to spread.

These organisms gained entrance to his jaw bone

and then caused a worsening infection

which progressed down through the neck into the chest.

This had to be painful.

This was eating away at his tissue.
[ … ]

NARRATOR Even as the infection spreads to his chest

and the pain becomes unbearable, Victor continues

to refuse medical attention.

MARK WALLACE Usually people would have a pretty dramatic

swelling and redness and tenderness, or difficulty

swallowing, high spiking fever.

DR. G It then spread to the neck

and around the glands out of the jaw,

and that pus dissected in between the layers of the neck

and between the fascial planes and up even going

into his mediastinitis, and I'm sure eventually into his blood.

NARRATOR Victor eventually succumbs to the infection

and passes out.

This man needed to be on antibiotics.

I mean it's a weird, weird complication.

NARRATOR His final decline is so rapid that when paramedics

arrive it is too late.

What began as a run of the mill oral infection has

become a fight for survival.

This is a sore throat from hell.

NARRATOR As the unchecked infection takes its course,

it enters the bloodstream and spreads throughout his body.

Eventually Victor's organs cease functioning.

He never makes it to the hospital.

The tragedy is compounded by the fact

that Victor's death could have easily been prevented.

In the pre-antibiotic era, this would be a very severe

likely fatal, uh, disease.

Physicians in the modern era are quick to give antibiotics for,

uh, suspected infections of the face or-- or, uh, neck.

So, um, there's not much chance for these severe infections

to develop, and the appropriate surgery and/or

antibiotics are provided in a timely manner

and people do well.

[music playing]

DR. G Unfortunately after doing this for years,

I see how people neglect their bodies.

I see how people take terrible care of themselves.

I see how people drive too fast and die from accidents.

I see how people do stupid things and die.

All their choices.

So no, I don't get frustrated anymore.

Not going to a doctor because you have a sore throat

is your choice.

But if it gets bad enough, I'll see you.

[music playing]

(SINGING) You can call me any time you're feeling lonely.

I never wanted [inaudible].