In the Rozenberg rest home in Oostrozebeke, another suspicious hypo was diagnosed in a resident last week. The research unit of ‘VTM Nieuws’ and Het Laatste Nieuws knows this. It concerns a 74-year-old man who survived a murder attempt in March last year. He survived this time too. The court has already raided the rest home and confiscated the medical file. According to the first analyses, the man would not have been injected with insulin, but does that mean that the man has not been poisoned?
Last Thursday morning: the GP of a 74-year-old resident receives a phone call from the Rozenberg residential care center in Oostrozebeke. It’s urgent. One of his patients has a sugar trap, a hypo. His values are abnormally low and he has no diabetes. Immediately all alarm bells go off. Since the story came out that the court has been investigating at least three deaths and six murder attempts in this retirement home for almost two years, the nerves have been tense.
The doctor immediately comes to the scene and takes a blood sample from the man. When those analyzes are ready two days later, it will appear that no conclusive cause can be found for the hypo. The chief doctor then decides to go to the public prosecutor’s office and the Agency for Care and Health also receives an email. In that e-mail, the director refers to “a suspicious hypoglycemia”. It is immediately made clear that there is no question of an insulin injection. Yet a day later, the court raided the rest home and the GP and the man’s medical file was confiscated.
The 74-year-old resident is no stranger to the court. In March of last year, the man had already been the victim of an insulin overdose. Even then he survived. Because he was on the mend during that time, no blood was taken. That was the case this time. According to the first analyses, this should show that no insulin has been injected. But is that certain that the man was not poisoned?
In people who do not suffer from diabetes, hypoglycemia or sugar trap is very rare and therefore always suspicious. Apart from an overdose by an insulin injection, poisoning by administering pills is also a possibility. This cannot be seen in the blood, but it can be seen in the victim’s urine. Remarkable: the urine was not checked by the GP last Thursday. When the analyzes of the blood on Saturday could not show an identifiable cause, the chief doctor decided to take a urine sample after all. That sample has also been handed over to the investigators in the meantime.
It is therefore not clear for the time being whether there was another assassination attempt in Oostrozebeke last week. Since this week, the Kortrijk public prosecutor’s office has announced a complete stop in communication regarding the file. This time, the Agency for Care and Health is satisfied that they have been informed by the residential care center. The measures against the rest home will run until the end of the month, spokesman Joris Moonens said. This means that the rest home is not allowed to accept any new patients and that it must report weekly on the medication policy. Moonens also informs us that the residential care center will soon receive another visit from the Healthcare Inspectorate.
READ ALSO. Possible seventh murder attempt in Oostrozebeke rest home: “Mother got an overdose of insulin two days in a row”
Sound recordings show why residential care center Oostrozebeke only went to the police after the fourth poisoning: “If you call something ‘suspicious murder’, the public prosecutor and the entire reutemeteut will be added”
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