"We were waiting for the medical examiner to come out with a manner of death and that took a little longer than usual," said Chief Carl Sferrazza of Enfield Police. Patel, 45, who lives in Suffield, posted $25,000 bail and is scheduled to appear at Superior Court in Enfield on Feb. 24. Enfield detectives got involved in the case shortly after the death of Judith Gan, 64, of Ellington, at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield on Feb. 17, 2014 — exactly a year before Patel's arrest. State dental regulators concluded that Patel failed to adequately respond when Gan's oxygen levels dropped dangerously low as she was consciously sedated in the middle of the tooth extraction and implant procedures in his Enfield office that day. Patel ignored the patient's deteriorating condition and did not respond when changes in her oxygen levels and vital signs were reported to him by the dental assistants, state Department of Public Health inspectors said in the charging statement. The report also stated that the dentist ignored the situation and continued with the procedure even when his assistants prompted him that the patient was in a bad state. In response to the criminal charges, Patel's attorney, Paul Knag, released a statement that said, "After several months of deliberation, the state Dental Commission found that Dr. Patel's actions did not warrant the revocation of his license. "In the Dental Commission proceeding, multiple expert witnesses testified that Dr. Patel followed the standard of care," Krag said. Kenny wonders if the tampering with evidence charge will entice the Commission to reopen its investigation and possibly revoke Patel's license for good. "Dr. Patel disputes the charges and urges that the charges be dropped," his attorney Paul Knag said in a statement Wednesday. Rick Kenny, an attorney for Gan's husband, Michael, said: "I think he was very appreciative of the amount of work done by the detective bureau and by chief of police in Enfield." Patel also violated care standards in December 2013 when another patient under conscious sedation to have teeth extracted inhaled a piece of gauze called a throat pack, which was designed to protect him from swallowing foreign objects, the commission found.
– A woman who went to the dentist for a tooth extraction ended up dying after flat-lining in his chair, and now the Connecticut dentist has been charged with criminally negligent homicide in her death. Judith Gan, 64, went into Rashmi Patel's office on Feb. 17 of last year for a full-mouth extraction, during which 20 teeth would be removed and implants would be inserted. But during the procedure, Patel allegedly ignored the sedated woman's worsening condition—even though the low-oxygen alarm went off multiple times, Gan started gurgling, wheezing, and changing color, and one of Patel's assistants "begged" him to stop working on her, inspectors say. The assistant finally called 911, but by then Gan had stopped breathing and "flat-lined," according to a health inspectors' report. She was declared dead at a hospital; Patel has also been charged with evidence tampering. Gan had health problems, including a heart attack six months prior to her death and two strokes in the two years prior, the Monitor Daily reports; she was also on medication that could have interfered with sedation. "That's of course an issue into whether she should have been sedated in the first place," the Gan family lawyer says, per Fox Connecticut. But, he adds, the medical examiner who performed the autopsy "ruled out a lot of potential problems as causes of her death. Her pre-existing things did not ... suddenly occur and cause her to die." Officials also say Patel, 45, should not have planned so many procedures at once. The Dental Commission declined to revoke his license, but it did put him on five years of probation and banned him from performing sedation, the Hartford Courant reports. He has previously been accused of failing to monitor a sedated patient who choked on gauze but survived, the AP reports, as well as other problems. (A trip to the dentist may have saved this girl's life.)