Monday, January 28, 20083
Doctor advised against a home birth, gets sued anyways
Are physicians now to blame for patients' choices that go wrong?
It will fall to a Summit County jury to decide whether the mother was responsible because of the beliefs she held and the choices she made in opting for a home birth, or a physician is to blame because she failed to inform the mother of the risks involved.
In opening statements Thursday morning, plaintiff's attorney James Casey said Dr. Kristin Trump is to blame because she never told the mother that she was at risk.
Marilena DiSilvio, the doctor's lawyer, said the physician should not be held accountable "for choices she didn't make, and for choices she counseled against."
Comments
"It's your fault doctor; you didn't persuade me enough."
Is that it?
And there are those who will argue that patients are entitled to make their own decisions about what they will have done to or for them. O.K. . . . .
I suppose that if the outcome were the same in hospital, the doctor would be blamed and sued. And if the birth were uncomplicated at home with the midwife, the doctor would be disparaged as being unknowledgeable and self-serving in his caution.
The mother elected this method AMA; why is the "court-appointed representative" not also naming her in the suit?
Oh, that's right, she hasn't got malpractice insurance. And good luck getting a settlement from her homeowner's policy.
1:10 PM
That means she actually could try for a vaginal delivery if she so desired, but this could take place safely only in a hospital setting where emergency caesarean could be performed with obstructed labor; laparotomy could be done for uterine rupture, or at least an experienced obstetrician at hand to deliver impacted shoulders.
This woman clearly has acted against medical advice, in fact against all reason and all common knowledge. Even my old mother would advice against this sort of reckless behavior.
And then this nonsense about early clamping of the cord: That pice of nformation alone tells me that this woman is an altie of the fourth kind (the "I would rather die" is the third kind - she is "I would rather my kids died" - kind, like the Watchtower idiots).
If this case is even brought to trial, there is really nothing left to salvage from the justice system in the US. Just throw it all away, scrap the constitution and start all over again with clean sheets and new crayons.
1:47 PM
7:53 PM
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