For many men the worst nightmare would be you’re on life support and the doctors decide to leave the decision over whether or not to pull the plug up to….YOUR EX WIFE!!!!

Well it turns out that may be exactly what happened to Gary Coleman.

Entertainment Weekly reports:

Gary Coleman’s former lawyer claims the actor was divorced from Shannon Price at the time of his death on May 28, People reports. Randy Kester claims the pair’s marriage ended on Aug. 12, 2008, which raises questions about Price’s legal right to take Coleman off life support. “We’re definitely concerned about this and we’re looking into what exactly happened here,” Janet Frank, a spokesperson for the Utah Valley Regional Medical Center — the hospital in which Coleman passed away — told People. “Shannon certainly portrayed herself as his wife to our staff and doctors. We assumed she was telling the truth. We can’t comment on specific details in Mr. Coleman’s case, but in general, any patient on life support is thoroughly evaluated medically before life support is ended.”

I’m not suggesting that Coleman’s ex-wife did him in but I am questioning whether hospitals are so eager to get people off life support that they’ll pretty much take anybody’s word for it that this person needs to be dispatched to the great beyond pronto.

This is kind of a big decision that there’s really no coming back from. So don’t you think it should require some attention before we start pulling plugs? Is this happening so often that hospitals have become a bit…cavalier about life and death decisions? (That’s a rhetorical question.)

I think many men would rather have a stranger on the street making that decision rather than their ex-wife.