Tragedy struck at the Armando Businco Oncology Hospital in Cagliari, where a heart problem reportedly caused the death of Fabio Vacca, 47, from Villacidro, during the night between Sunday and Monday. He was scheduled to undergo spleen surgery the following morning.
The complaint
The family filed a complaint with the Carabinieri at the Villacidro station, alleging medical malpractice. The Prosecutor's Office decided to investigate and halted Vacca's funeral, originally scheduled for today but postponed to a later date. The magistrate ordered the seizure of the body, necessary for an autopsy to determine the cause of death and any liability.
Suffering from thalassemia and waiting to be seen for spleen problems, the 47-year-old had ended up in the emergency room in San Gavino about twenty days before his death.
The tragedy
He had been rushed there by an ambulance called by his parents for a very high fever, caused, as it turned out after his hospitalization, by a rare bacteria. From San Gavino, a few days later, the man was transported first to the Brotzu Hospital in Cagliari, where he remained in intensive care for approximately a week, and then to the Businco Hospital. The situation worsened between Sunday and Monday, during his hospitalization in Cagliari, when Vacca, having eradicated the bacteria, was awaiting spleen surgery. The man was actually supposed to have the operation some time ago, so much so that a medical appointment was scheduled for mid-October. Vacca never showed up for that appointment because he had been admitted to the San Gavino hospital as an emergency patient for a spleen infection a few days earlier.
The file
On Monday, shocked by Fabio's sudden and untimely passing, his family filed a complaint with the Villacidro Carabinieri. Public Prosecutor Giangiacomo Pilia received the complaint and opened a case against unknown persons for manslaughter. The body was then placed under arrest for evaluation. An autopsy, necessary to determine the cause of death, will likely be performed tomorrow morning.
