California man learns he’s dying from doctor on robot video

FREMONT, Calif. (AP) — A family is devastated after their relative was told he didn’t have long to live by a doctor appearing on a robot’s video screen.

San Francisco news station KTVU reported Thursday that 78-year-old Ernest Quintana went Sunday to Kaiser Permanente Medical Center’s emergency department in Fremont.

Granddaughter Annalisia Wilharm was with Quintana when a nurse said a doctor would be making his rounds. She says a robot arrived and the doctor appeared on a video screen.

Wilharm says she was stunned to hear by video that her grandfather’s lungs were failing and he didn’t have long to live. He died Tuesday.

Michelle Gaskill-Hames, senior vice president for Kaiser Permanente says in a statement that this was a “highly unusual circumstance.”

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This version corrects age of Ernest Quintana