Corticosteroids are sometimes given to patients suffering from arthritis, asthma, multiple sclerosis, lumbar processes or sciatica, among other conditions. José Perea González (Granada, 1982) explains to EL ESPAÑOL that he was prescribed these drugs continuously for four years, in an attempt to put an end to his chronic back pain, but that this treatment almost cost him his life: “I took enough corticosteroids to kill an elephant.“.
The proof is that José suffers from necrosis and arthroplasty in several joints of his body, which made him consider a millionaire claim of 723,000 euros against the Andalusian Health Service (SAS). “This money doesn’t even give me back my life. All these years that were stolen from me are priceless and I will never be able to get them back,” reflects this man from Granada, who was left with absolute permanent disability in 2018 .
“Necrosis has eaten away almost all my joints: both hips, left shoulder, left ankle, left elbow and now it’s hitting my left knee. On October 23 I have an appointment with traumatology.”
hace eleven years and four months Andmpézo the test for health of Josephthe culmination of which was a process of necrosis that affected several joints in his upper and lower body. High doses of cortisol caused his body tissues, in this case bone tissue, to die. This is indicated in the extensive real estate claim presented by his lawyer, Joaquín Perales, and which includes an expert medical report submitted to the Andalusian Health Service:
“The exhibitor, on July 13, 2013, was treated in the emergency department of the San Cecilio Hospital in Granada, due to a lumbo-sciatic process, prescribe treatment with corticosteroids, This is the first time there has been documented evidence of corticosteroid treatment. This treatment is a valid option to treat the pathology presented, since it aims to have an anti-inflammatory action on the spinal lesion, but It is a decision that is not free of risks, complications and side effects.as will be explained later.
José, played the tuba in the municipal orchestra of Cúllar, before his health problems began.
Of July 2013 to March In 2017, they continued to manage itsteroid hormone to Joseph and the proverbial saying that “the cure is worse than the disease” became a reality for the man who was at that time a happy thirty-year-old, working in a family building materials business and passionate about the tuba. : the instrument he played in the municipal music group of Cúllar. “It all started with a simple back pain,” remembers this Grenaden. “I had issues with sciatica.”
– Why did they start administering corticosteroids to stop the conflict with the roots of the sciatic nerve?
– José Perea González: The discomfort was not relieved even when they implanted an electrostimulator subcutaneously, at the waist level. It was a device meant to cut off the pain signal the leg was sending to the brain, but it didn’t work.
They also operated on my back four or five times on L4, L5… and seeing that there was still no improvement, they tried corticosteroids. If the dose of corticosteroids didn’t work, they increased it, and that had been planned for years, in the end it ruined my life.
José, 42 years old, does not exaggerate in his remarks, and defines his clinical history as “Petete’s great book”. All because it includes many hospitalizations; his time in neurosurgery consultations; by the Pain Unit; for traumatology; for internal medicine; for psychiatry; seven spinal operations; four surgeries to give him prostheses due to the necrosis of his joints; repair different areas of your body; aesthetic consequences; anatomofunctional sequelae…
“My life is made up of going in and out of the hospital,” he insists. Sometimes in San Cecicilio and other times in the Virgen de las Nieves in Granada where there was no shortage of corticosteroid treatments. Which deteriorated his state of health to the point that the property claim presented to the Andalusian Health Service reflects frightening information: José needed 3.741 recovery days to stabilize your clinical condition.
From the Government of Andalusia They refuse to evaluate the content of the real estate claim who asks them for compensation of 723,000 euros, “for bodily injury” and “moral damage, due to a serious loss of quality of life” of the patient José Perea González. “We do not take a position on this type of procedure”underlines a spokesperson for the Ministry of Health consulted by this newspaper.
One of the physical changes he experienced was due to corticosteroids.
“All I have is because of taking cortisone,” insists the person concerned. The main action of this drug is anti-inflammatory, but doctors tend to be careful when administering it because it generates side effects such as increased blood pressure or weight gain due to retention of fat. water. José can attest to this: “I became like a whale. “I got out of both sides of the bed: I weighed 140 kilos.”
This patient’s clinical history shows that his admissions did not stop due to the pain of his sciatica and that he continued treatment with high doses of steroids, despite complications, such as skin rashes due to staphylococcal dermatitis or immunosuppression. In fact, José claims that he arrived “to be clinically dead” in 2016, when he suffered two emergency admissions in the same month. “They thought I wasn’t going to advance.” This is how the ownership claim states:
“On May 15, 2016, he had to go again to the emergency room of the Virgen de las Nieves Hospital in Granada, issuing a report stating that has an adverse reaction to prolonged treatment with corticosteroidswith oropharyngeal mycosis and bronchial hyperreactivity”.
“He is referred to the infectious diseases of the San Cecilio Hospital, where he remains admitted, with a diagnosis of febrile syndrome of probable respiratory origin in an immunocompromised patient, acute bronchitis, oropharyngeal candidiasis, Cushing’s syndrome and obesity. All this derives chronic use of high-dose corticosteroids […]”.
“He must be admitted again on May 25, 2015 to the San Cecilio Hospital in Granada, due to multipolar pneumonia due to Klebsiella Pneumoniae and probable pulmonary aspergillosis in a patient immunocompromised by corticosteroid therapy. […]”. Joaquín Perales, José’s lawyer, criticizes the “deficiency in the application of prolonged treatment and high doses of corticosteroids, being the cause of the injuries suffered by my client”.
Lawyer Joaquín Perales, examining the real estate claim filed against the SAS, in his office in Granada.
Basically, José’s mistake was to trust the recommendations of the various doctors who saw him and who repeatedly prescribed: corticosteroid therapy. They started in July 2013, it started to decrease in June 2016 and it stopped definitively in March 2017.
This is reflected in one of the documents that contains the allegation: “The treatment with corticosteroids was gradually stopped by the Endocrinology Department of the San Cecilio Hospital, on June 28, 2016, recognizing the treatment with high doses of steroids for about three years. , for neurosurgery of herniated discs.
– What is the basis of your request for 723,000 euros from the Andalusian Health Service?
– Joaquin Perales: The corticosteroid treatment my client received resulted in a much more serious condition than the reason he initially sought help. In the entire medical history of José Perea, there is not a single written informed consent given to the patient regarding the side effects of continuing this treatment, which is why Mr. Perea was never able to decide whether to he had to continue the same treatment. or not.
Throughout this long-term medical process, he was not informed of the possibility of carrying out an alternative treatment to the prolonged application of high-dose corticosteroids. The Andalusian Health Service has committed an infraction of the lex artis. This is a complex issue, but it is viable due to the expert medical report we provided in our land claim.
This is what the forensic expert concludes. the origin of “osteonecroses in different joints” from which José Perea González suffers: “It should be noted that all these factors, side effects and consequences of the prolonged application of high-dose corticosteroid therapy should have been adequately informed to the patient, not appearing in the total documentation provided, document drawn up and signed in which Mr Perea was informed”.
José Perea, this Wednesday, looks back on his clinical history.
“The continuous application of high doses of corticosteroids caused Mr. Perea to have infectious processes derived from immunosuppression, which led to various hospitalizations in 2016 and 2017. Due to osteonecrosis, he suffered from necrosis avascular of both hips, requiring total arthroplasties with prosthesis, avascular necrosis of the left humeral head. […]”.
“As we can see, the injuries caused to Mr. José Perea González, due to the mistreatment applied and the lack of information on this subject, have caused injuries that, until now, have not even stabilized “.
This man from Grenada, who sometimes relies on a cane or crutches to walk, has had hyaluronic acid injections and even takes oxycodone –a drug from the opioid family. “I try to go to the gym as the doctors recommended, to strengthen myself, because tomorrow, when I am 60 years old, I want to continue walking and do it straight,” remarks José.
– How would you summarize the last eleven years since your health began to deteriorate?
– Since I started this process, I have given up my hobbies, like playing the tuba after twenty years of activity, I have lost two partners, friends, I can no longer work… See you more On one occasion it occurred to me to commit suicide because I didn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.
