Loxahatchee man files legal action to force doctors to treat his wife with ivermectin

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla .– A man from Loxahatchee filed a lawsuit in Palm Beach County Circuit Court six weeks after his wife was admitted to Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center in a induced coma and strapped to a ventilator.

Ryan Drock, 41, wanted health officials to treat his wife, Tamara Drock, 47, with ivermectin, a drug approved to treat people with parasitic worms but not those with coronavirus.

Tamara was diagnosed with the virus and admitted to the hospital’s intensive care unit on August 23 and placed on high flow oxygen. Court records indicate that she was treated with the hospital’s COVID-19 protocol, which includes Remdesivir, steroids and antibiotics. However, on September 20, her condition deteriorated and she was sedated, intubated and placed on a ventilator.

After no signs of improvement and after exhausting the COVID-19 protocol, Drock requested that his wife be treated with ivermectin. But health officials refused.

Drock said he believes the drug has helped him and others recover from the coronavirus. He said he had read stories about people, like his wife, who were seriously ill with COVID-19 and were cured after taking ivermectin.

Court records show he offered to sign a waiver so the hospital would not be held responsible if the ivermectin treatment didn’t work or caused other problems, but health officials refused.

“My wife is on the verge of death, she has no other choice,” he said.

Drock said Tamara was active and healthy before contracting the virus. She is a teacher at Egret Lake Elementary School in West Palm Beach and a mother of two young children.

According to the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ivermectin should not be used as a treatment for COVID-19 outside of a clinical setting.

A clinical trial is underway to determine whether ivermectin, along with other drugs, may be effective against COVID-19.

“In this trial, we are actually laying the drug based on the patient’s weight, and we are applying it at a low dose depending on the desired drug concentration that we need to treat the infection,” says Dr Rowena Dolor, one of the researchers in a government-funded trial.

Drock said he hopes Circuit Judge James Nutt will hear his request at a meeting scheduled for next week.

To learn more about COVID-19 clinical trials, click here.