Cauterizer Used Before Fire at UCLA

A surgical tool that emits tiny sparks was being used in a UCLA Medical Center operating room in which a 26-year-old woman died Monday after her bedclothes caught fire, fire officials said Tuesday.

The device, a penlike electric cauterizer, caused a similar operating-room fire two years ago that resulted in the death of a 19-day-old infant at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

But officials have not concluded that the cauterizer, used to stop bleeding from an incision, caused the fire that engulfed Angela Hernandez, 26, of Los Angeles, a traffic accident victim who was undergoing surgery early Monday morning for heart and liver injuries.

“It would be very simple to blame it on a cauterizer . . . but other things were in use in that operating room,” said Los Angeles Fire Department investigator William Burmester.

Electric paddle devices that stimulate the heart were also used by doctors operating on Hernandez, he said, noting that sparks from those devices--as well as the cauterizer--could ignite a flash fire in the oxygen-rich atmosphere.

Also unknown is whether Hernandez died as a result of the fire or from injuries sustained in the car accident, said coroner’s spokesman Scott Carrier. Results of an autopsy are expected to be released today, along with a report on the cause of the fire.

Hernandez was taken to the hospital after she was injured at 11:45 p.m. Sunday in Santa Monica. She was one of four people in a 1976 Toyota that stalled while traveling down the narrow ramp from Ocean Boulevard to Pacific Coast Highway, according to Santa Monica Police Sgt. Robert Oliver.

The car’s occupants climbed out, Oliver said, and Hernandez stood at the front of the vehicle while a male passenger stood behind it, trying to flag down motorists. Soon after, another car swerved to avoid hitting the man and struck the Toyota, which rammed into Hernandez, Oliver said. The driver of the second vehicle was not cited.

The fire in the UCLA operating room occurred at about 5:30 a.m. after the surgery was completed, fire officials said. Although as many as 10 doctors and other medical personnel were in the room, they were unable to put out the flames on her surgical drapes before smoke forced them to flee, leaving her behind, officials said.

The fire at Cedars-Sinai, on Oct. 6, 1988, caused the death of a premature infant identified only as Baby de Jesus. The incident was ruled an accident by the Fire Department, which determined that a spark from the cauterizing device ignited a breathing mixture of 90% oxygen. The source of the leak was never identified.

A lawsuit filed by the infant’s family is pending, hospital spokesman Ron Wise said. Citing the litigation, Wise declined to say whether the infant’s death resulted in new operating-room procedures.