The State - News from Nov. 11, 1988

An Ojai kidney patient who claimed she had been refused life-sustaining dialysis treatment from doctors in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties said she has found a clinic in the San Fernando Valley willing to care for her. Jeanie Joshua, 38, a former gym teacher, contended that she had been denied care by more than a dozen physicians because of a 1986 malpractice suit she filed against a kidney specialist in Santa Barbara. Her last physician, who was ordered by a Santa Barbara County judge last week to provide treatment for her until today, said she had become a difficult patient who was overly aggressive about directing her own medical care. Joshua, a frail, 87-pound woman who suffers from lupus, said that making a 140-mile round-trip commute three times a week would be a “slow death,” but the judge declined to intercede further.