Whistleblower Docs Claim Deaths, Booze Bottles At BK Hospital

PROSPECT LEFFERTS GARDENS — Two prominent surgeons blew the whistle on poor care, deaths and one former doctor's alcohol bottle-strewn office at a Brooklyn hospital and drew the ire of their superiors in return, according to two lawsuits.

The lawsuits by Rainer Gruessner and John Renz center largely around their concerns over the now-inactive cardiothoracic and organ transplant programs at SUNY Downstate Medical Center, the Wall Street Journal first reported.

Renz's complaint includes an email, sent to a superior, detailing how one surgeon effectively abandoned a transplant patient, forcing Renz and Gruessner to rush from California and Arizona, respectively, to perform surgery.

"This saved the patient's life," he wrote.

Gruessner, who led the team that performed surgery on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords after she was shot, took a post at the Brooklyn hospital in 2017 to turn around its faltering surgery programs, the Wall Street Journal reported.

He recruited Renz from Chicago to help with the Brooklyn hospital's transplant program, according to Renz's lawsuit.

Together, they discovered problems within the program ranging from misreported deaths and transplant failures to deaths caused by lack of patient care and inadequate prescriptions, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The email included in Renz's lawsuit also raises concerns about a former doctor whose office was found strewn with alcohol bottles and suspected drug paraphernalia after he left the hospital. Another doctor — the same who left the transplant patient without care — carried on an inappropriate relationship with a hospital pharmacist and had a history of leaving behind "foreign objects" inside patients, he wrote.

Gruessner claims he was fired after he made complaints, according to the Wall Street Journal. Renz, in his lawsuit, claimed hospital officials told him his employment would stop because of "budgetary" concerns.

Both Gruessner, who remains tenured faculty at SUNY, and Renz seek reinstatement to their positions.

The hospital received an overall "C" grade from Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade, a nonprofit organization focused on health system quality and safety.