A grieving father has filed a lawsuit after his 26-year-old son, a rising dental student, died following hospital treatment that he claims was overseen by a doctor working from a remote location.
Conor James Hylton, of New Haven, Connecticut, died on August 15, 2024, at Bridgeport Hospital’s Milford Campus.
In the legal complaint, Conor’s father, William H. Hylton, alleges that the care provided during his son’s final hours was being directed by a physician stationed about 12 miles away at Yale New Haven Health’s tele-clinic.
William says he and his wife, Betsy Hylton, arrived at the intensive care unit roughly an hour before Conor died, where they allegedly watched hospital staff trying to resuscitate him while a man appearing on a video screen issued instructions, according to the lawsuit.
“We saw the whole thing go down,” William told the Free Press. “We saw the guy on the TV screen running the whole thing remotely, telling the nurses and everyone else what to do.
“And you know, at first, it doesn’t maybe hit you, but then you start thinking, so this guy on the TV is really running the show here.”
The lawsuit contends that Conor’s death was “a direct result of the negligence of Bridgeport Hospital, Yale New Haven Hospital Inc.”
The filing also criticizes the medical team involved in Conor’s treatment, alleging that breakdowns in communication during the emergency response contributed to the outcome and were made worse by the remote-care arrangement.
Conor James Hylton from New Haven, Connecticut, died on August 15, 2024. He was a 26-year-old promising dental student
Conor died in the ICU at the Milford Campus of Bridgeport Hospital in Connecticut
The Daily Mail has contacted each defendant named in the lawsuit.
Yale New Haven Health previously told reporters that it ‘is aware of this lawsuit and is committed to providing the safest and highest quality of care possible; however, we are unable to comment on pending litigation’.
Conor’s nightmare began at 11am on August 14, when he arrived at the Bridgeport hospital after vomiting all day and being unable to keep his food down.
He had low blood pressure, EKG results suggesting heart rhythm problems, and elevated heart and respiratory rates.
His clinical record also noted a history of alcohol abuse, and within hours, doctors diagnosed him with conditions related to alcohol withdrawal, including dehydration, pancreatitis, and metabolic acidosis.
Conor was given medication and a hospital bed. His parents went home at 7pm, believing he was stable and in good hands, but his condition rapidly deteriorated overnight.
‘At approximately 4.30am, Mr Hylton slid down in bed, his eyes rolled back and he became unresponsive and exhibited seizure-like activity,’ the lawsuit reads.
Conor began vomiting blood and his heartrate dropped. Medics intubated him and attempted to perform life-saving measures, but he died just after 6am.
The lawsuit claims that efforts to save him and his pronouncement of death were ‘erroneously attributed to Dr. Denu in the medical record, but in reality, Dr. Denu did nothing and the pronouncement was done by a “tele-health” provider on a video screen.’
Dr Denu was the hospitalist overseeing the hospital on the night Conor died, but she told investigators she did not see ICU patients because they were seen by ICU tele-physicians instead, according to the Free Press. She is not named as a defendant in the lawsuit.
The lawsuit launched by Conor’s father accuses the hospital of giving his son ‘substandard care,’ saying the medics present for his final moments exhibited ‘extremely poor communication.’
Conor Hylton died after being treated by a physician who was allegedly working remotely via a screen, according to a lawsuit launched by his heartbroken relatives
Conor’s parents left him in the hospital overnight believing he was stable and in good hands – but they were rushed back to the ICU at 4.45am, about an hour before Conor died. The 26-year-old is pictured above in an old image from his family Facebook page
The lawsuit also claims that no physicians saw Conor in person while he was in the ICU ‘for hours’, and that his parents were not notified that his condition had deteriorated until he was almost dead.
His father, William, 63, said that he chose to take his son to the Bridgeport Hospital believing it would provide the best care.
‘I took him to Milford because it’s a little smaller than Yale New Haven, but it’s still a Yale facility,’ he told the Free Press. ‘We thought it might be quicker.’
William said he and his wife left the hospital at about 7pm on August 14, believing their son simply needed rehydration, which he would receive overnight.
They planned to return the next day with Conor’s two younger brothers, but were instead woken by a phone call from the hospital at 4.45am.
An ICU medic told the family that Conor was undergoing CPR and they would need to get to the hospital immediately.
William said his son had been in the ICU for almost five hours at this point, but nobody had notified them until was too late.
By the time they arrived, he said Conor ‘was, basically, for all intents and purposes, already dead.’
Qualifying as a dentist was Conor’s ‘life long dream’, according to his online obituary
The family attorney, Joel Faxon, said Conor essentially received care in a ‘fake ICU.’
‘You can’t delegate the responsibility for intensive care to somebody on a screen,’ Faxon told the Free Press.
‘I mean, it’s called intensive care for a reason. And this is why I say this is a fake ICU.’
Following in the footsteps of his parents who are both dentists, Conor was a promising student at the UConn School of Dental Medicine.
He studied his undergraduate degree at the University of Connecticut, and was a student athlete during his high school years at Notre Dame.
‘His gifted athleticism led him to play Irish football at the New Haven Gaelic Football Club and to receive his black belt in Taekwondo,’ his obituary reads.
Qualifying as a dentist was his ‘life long dream,’ according to the tribute.
His father’s lawsuit requests economic and emotional damages.
The Daily Mail has contacted Bridgeport Hospital, Yale New Haven Hospital, and Northeast Medical Group for comment.
