Hospital’s Treatment of Girl to Be Investigated

State health officials said Wednesday they plan to investigate the case of Rosa Olvera, the 11-month-old Oxnard girl stricken by flesh-eating bacteria to determine if she received proper care at Ventura County Medical Center.

The action was prompted by questions raised by the child’s grandmother and the hospital’s administrators about the delayed diagnosis and initial treatment of the potentially fatal disease, said Lana Pimbley of the state Department of Health Services.

“We will investigate,” said Pimbley, district manager of the licensure and certification office, which is charged with investigating unusual deaths or cases at local hospitals.

Hospital officials said Wednesday they had not been contacted about an investigation. But they said they are reviewing the care the child received on two separate visits to see if something could have been done sooner.

“Preliminary review shows that care given on both occasions was proper,” said Dr. Richard Ashby, medical director of the county hospital.

Rosa remained in critical but stable condition Wednesday after undergoing two hours of surgery Tuesday evening at Northridge Hospital Medical Center, her doctors said.

Surgeons attached nearly a square foot of cadaver skin over Rosa’s right chest, side and back, covering a wound left when surgeons removed strips of dead tissue ravaged by the bacteria. The grafts, designed to prevent deadly infection, are temporary and will be replaced with skin harvested from Rosa’s scalp and buttocks in one to two weeks.

“She is still on a respirator, but, hopefully within the next 48 hours, she will be off life support,” said Dr. Hooshang Semnani, head of pediatric critical care at Northridge Hospital, where Rosa was transferred Friday for the complicated procedure.

Rosa remained heavily sedated, but was able to open her eyes Wednesday and recognize her mother, Semnani said. Rosa’s parents, Miguel Olvera, 23, and Rosa Suarez, 20, declined comment.

But her maternal grandmother, Maria Suarez, 41, of Oxnard, said Wednesday she and the baby’s mother tried numerous doctors, knowing there was something wrong.

The usually lively baby had become listless, and they suspected it was more than a sore throat or flu. They took her to an Oxnard pediatrician, whose name Suarez could not remember, who prescribed antibiotics and told the family that Rosa appeared to be suffering from a minor throat problem.

“She woke up Monday and I said, ‘This baby is not well,’ ” Suarez said. “She is very active, but her activity declined a lot. The doctor said all she has was a swollen throat.”

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That night, however, the baby was still visibly in pain, and had a fluctuating temperature. After a long night of standing vigil over the sick baby, the Suarez family took her to Ventura County Medical Center about 3 a.m. on June 30. The hospital kept her for about two hours, giving her only Tylenol and Motrin, Suarez said.

“I was looking at her on the way home, and I said, ‘I don’t know. She seems the same,’ ” Suarez said. “I don’t think she got any better at the hospital.”’

When Suarez returned from work July 1, her daughter was still tending to the sick child, whose condition appeared to be worsening.

After some friends recommended a doctor in Tijuana, the family drove to Mexico.

“I got tired of seeing her that way, so I said, ‘Let’s go to Tijuana,’ ” Suarez said. “We went to a doctor that was recommended to us.”

The Tijuana doctor told the family that the baby was seriously ill and infected from top to bottom with something, but could not immediately determine what was wrong.

“He said it was a serious thing, and he wanted to keep her for more testing, but I told him, ‘I can’t. We need to go back.’ ”

They came back the same day. The Tijuana doctor had also given the baby some antibiotics, through an injection, and he had given her some type of medicine she could not recall.

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The baby seemed to improve, Suarez said, and even ate some grapes and began acting more lively.

“But by the afternoon, we noticed her stomach was swelling.”

They took the baby back to Ventura County Medical Center about 5 p.m. Thursday.

“They said she was not doing well, that she was dying,” Suarez said. “That same night, they said they were going to take her to the other hospital.”

Suarez said she was surprised that the Ventura hospital did not determine the baby was seriously ill during the first visit, because it was obvious to her that it was no mere cold or flu. She welcomed a state investigation, but quickly added that the welfare of the baby was her primary concern.

“We took her to the hospital first, but we saw no improvements afterward, so we took her to some other doctors. She didn’t change. She was the same. Then she got worse.”

Officials at the state Medical Board said they have not received any complaints about Rosa’s condition, and are not reviewing the case at this time.

Dr. John M. Leedom, head of infectious diseases at the USC School of Medicine, said necrotizing fasciitis is extremely rare and very difficult to diagnose by physicians who are not experts in the field.

“It’s a very uncommon disease,” Leedom said. “Most doctors will go their whole careers and never see one case.”

Times staff writers Jose Cardenas and Hilary MacGregor also contributed to this story.