Remembering Alabama OB-GYN Dr. Larry Stutts, MD, DVM

“Men more frequently require to be reminded than informed.”

-Samuel Johnson (1709-1784), Rambler #2 (March 24, 1750)

Dr. Larry Stutts, MD, DVM was elected as a Republican to Alabama State Senate District 6 in 2014 by a 70-vote margin. His 36-year-old patient Rose Church, RN died 10 days after giving birth in 1998 because he refused to order a $5 test, and sent her home from the hospital early.

After narrowly winning election in 2014 by 70 votes in Alabama State Senate District 6, Dr. Larry Stutts, MD, DVM, a Republican, immediately wrote a bill (SB289) to repeal Code of Alabama Title 27-48-2, commonly known as “Rose’s Law,” which unanimously passed the House & Senate and become law in 1999.

“Rose’s Law” was written in response to the death of Stutts’ patient, Rose Church, a 36-year-old Registered Nurse, who died of a heart attack 10 days after giving birth to a girl in 1998 at Helen Keller Hospital in Sheffield. A simple $5 test could have saved her life, but Stutts refused to order the test, and sent her home early.

“Roses Law” gave women in Alabama a legal right to remain in hospital for 48 hours after a normal live birth, 96 hours if the birth was Cesarean or presented a complication, and required health insurers in Alabama to pay for the stay.

Stutts’ bill (SB289) would have repealed “Rose’s Law,” and would have also repealed a State law requiring physicians to notify a woman in writing that her mammogram showed dense tissue that may mask breast cancer.

Alabama State Senate District 6

When it was discovered that Stutts was trying to repeal a law written to protect women from that type of malpractice, a national outcry quickly emerged, and Stutts withdrew his bill in shame.

In response, Gene Church, Rose’s husband, said, “This was a personal vendetta. The irony is that 16 years later no one remembered what happened with my wife, or very few people did. Now, sadly for him, everybody is going to know.”

Stutts will be up for re-election 2018.

UPDATE ADDENDUM: Stutts campaigned for re-election in 2018, and according to the Secretary of State’s website, won with 50.85%, or 22,631 votes, while Democratic challenger Johnny Mack Morrow won 48.83%, or 21,732 votes of 44,504 votes cast. Johnny Mack Morrow is an ethical, renown, respected, and long-time former legislator in the Alabama State House of Representatives, where he represented the 18th State House District from 1990-2018.

In Colbert County (population 54,500), Stutts got 11,113 votes, while Morrow won 9,527; and in Marion County (population 29,833), Stutts garnered 4,267 votes while his challenger Morrow won 1,986 votes. Stutts did not win in Franklin County, but won in Morrow’s hometown of Red Bay (population 3158) and nearby towns of Vina (population 358) and Hodges (population 288).