Midwife charged in DC? Karen Carr, CPM...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The ultimate blame lies with the parents. First, a home delivery of a breech baby for a 43-year old first time mom. Second, waiting to call 911 after 13 mins of resuscitation. What were they thinking? Obviously, they weren't.

First, her choice.

Second, how would calling 911 earlier have helped?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Citation, yourself. Wax was discredited and is therefore not sufficient evidence either way. The best evidence actually shows that homebirth is as safe as hospital birth, and uses fewer potentially harmful interventions.

I wasn't referring to Wax, I was referring to Johnson and Daviss, as well as the state database of Wisconsin. Your cites?

http://www.dhs.wisconsin.gov/wish/measures/inf_mort/long_form.html

Wow, I smell a Dr. Amy rat.

http://www.babble.com/pregnancy/giving-birth/winning-homebirth-debate/

Sorry, I'm not a rat. Do you all really think there's only one person on the whole internet that has looked at the evidence for homebirth safety and found it... lacking?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Assuming the statement about 13 minutes is true, I am utterly shocked...My daughter was born a few weeks ago in a large hospital. She wasn't breathing well (1-min Apgar was 3) and had to be resuscitated. The NICU people appeared within 30 seconds of her birth and got her breathing normally within a few minutes. I can't imagine waiting 13 minutes to call for help!

Your baby survived easily. This poor baby died. In the year 2011 in Washington, DC, there is no excuse for this sort of ignorance. It's tragic.

You do realize that there are other babies who die and/or are severely brain damaged - yes, even in hospitals - due to getting stuck? Yes, it is tragic, but it has nothing to do with ignorance. In rare cases, babies get stuck and die at birth. Awful but true.

I feel really sorry for you, second poster.
It is your type of ignorant, extreme rhetoric which fed into the birth mother's extreme fear of delivering in a hospital.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One fact I learned today -- that comes from the statement of facts agreed upon by the plea deal -- is that Carr tried for 20 minutes to free the baby's head and then another 13 minutes to resuscitate the baby before calling 911. Waiting 33 minutes to get additional medical help is inexcusable. I was supportive of her until I learned that.

Can you provide any sort of source for this? I am going to have nightmares about this for a long time to come. If this is true....poor little baby.....

Why THE HELL is everyone so shocked by this? It was already said in the original article! It's the basis for SO MANY anti-Carr posts in here, and the basis of equally damning ones on how far midwife research can really take you. Did you think we were making it up??

I can only assume she either has a messianic complex or that she was covering her unlicensed ass by avoiding the 911 call. When I pushed on this, a Carr defender said “there was nothing that a speedy transfer would have accomplished in this case. When a baby is stuck, there is no EMT on the planet who is going to have more skill than the midwife to get it out, and, by the time you make it to a hospital it would be too late anyway” – like that makes the entire home-birth plan for this case any more logical???!!!!!! It just proved my point that controlling your birth plan FROM the hospital is safest.

Carr’s a perfect example of a how easy it is to misrepresent yourself as an experienced, responsible, ethical and competent, CERTIFIED midwife. Ego+$+covering her ass from liability. Sounds like what many have accused OBs of here… Women have the right to choose where to give birth. Exercise it objectively and defensively at least. Learn from this – ask what the plan is for emergencies and keep your cell phone nearby to override the midwife if you insist on doing this from home.

You are letting your rage get the better of you, or perhaps you don't really know much about birth. When a baby gets stuck during the birth, the only option is to work to free the baby and complete the delivery. A speedy 911 call is NOT going to change the outcome. An EMT is NOT going to be able to offer anything greater than what the skilled midwife/OB is already doing. Even having an operating room three doors down is NOT going to help. Once a baby is partially born, there are no other magic answers; you have to finish getting the baby out, and if more than 10 minutes pass, the baby is just not going to make it unless there is a miracle. Maybe you take some personal comfort from thinking that a hospital could have saved this baby, and I think that as mothers who are horrified at this case, it is easy to believe that the right medical team could have saved this baby. However, I honestly believe that the outcome would have been exactly the same regardless of where the birth occurred. This is a risk - thankfully an extremely small risk - that all mothers take when they give birth vaginally.

I think your assessment that Carr was just trying to cover her ass by not calling 911 is wrong, too. In these situations, the only reason homebirth midwives call 911 is precisely TO cover their asses. Everyone knows that it is not going to actually help the baby, it just helps relieve the care providers responsibility. Just because something goes wrong at a birth, it does not mean that the care provider has some huge ego or did something incompetently.

In response to the bolded area above, No , of course the EMT will not be able to magically unstick the poor baby. However, the EMT can start an IV, give oxygen to the mom and transfer the mom to the hospital immediately. THE EMT can notify the hospital to have resources available upon arrival.

[Anonymous]

"You do realize that there are other babies who die and/or are severely brain damaged - yes, even in hospitals - due to getting stuck? Yes, it is tragic, but it has nothing to do with ignorance. In rare cases, babies get stuck and die at birth. Awful but true.


I feel really sorry for you, second poster.
It is your type of ignorant, extreme rhetoric which fed into the birth mother's extreme fear of delivering in a hospital."

to be very, very clear, it was not homebirth rhetoric that made her choose to have a home birth, it was the traumatic death of her mother, in hospital, leaving her a stranded teenager to grow up without a mother, that was the driving factor in her choice. the prosecution made this very clear.

this is probably the reason they agreed to a plea deal. the mother was equally at fault for child endangerment, there is case law addressing this, and they did not want to make her endure questioning on the stand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Citation, yourself. Wax was discredited and is therefore not sufficient evidence either way. The best evidence actually shows that homebirth is as safe as hospital birth, and uses fewer potentially harmful interventions.

I wasn't referring to Wax, I was referring to Johnson and Daviss, as well as the state database of Wisconsin. Your cites?

http://www.dhs.wisconsin.gov/wish/measures/inf_mort/long_form.html

Wow, I smell a Dr. Amy rat.

http://www.babble.com/pregnancy/giving-birth/winning-homebirth-debate/

Sorry, I'm not a rat. Do you all really think there's only one person on the whole internet that has looked at the evidence for homebirth safety and found it... lacking?

Dr. Amy is notorious for pulling out Johnson and Daviss, which actually supports homebirth, and then rearranging it to suit her own crazy agenda. She also loves that Wisconsin database, which is a total joke at trying to prove anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"You do realize that there are other babies who die and/or are severely brain damaged - yes, even in hospitals - due to getting stuck? Yes, it is tragic, but it has nothing to do with ignorance. In rare cases, babies get stuck and die at birth. Awful but true.


I feel really sorry for you, second poster.
It is your type of ignorant, extreme rhetoric which fed into the birth mother's extreme fear of delivering in a hospital."

to be very, very clear, it was not homebirth rhetoric that made her choose to have a home birth, it was the traumatic death of her mother, in hospital, leaving her a stranded teenager to grow up without a mother, that was the driving factor in her choice. the prosecution made this very clear.

this is probably the reason they agreed to a plea deal. the mother was equally at fault for child endangerment, there is case law addressing this, and they did not want to make her endure questioning on the stand.

I am not sure where your info comes from, perhaps you were one of Ms. Carr's supporters in the court room.

How can you not see that the mother's tragic loss of her own mother caused a perhaps unreasonable fear/suspicion of hospitals?

How can you not see that Ms. Carr's reassurances about her own "experience" level and the safety of homebirth all fed into the mother's decision to birth at home and the resultant horrible outcome for the baby?

Ms Carr, perhaps innocently enough, FED the mother's concerns/paranoia/suspicions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One fact I learned today -- that comes from the statement of facts agreed upon by the plea deal -- is that Carr tried for 20 minutes to free the baby's head and then another 13 minutes to resuscitate the baby before calling 911. Waiting 33 minutes to get additional medical help is inexcusable. I was supportive of her until I learned that.

Can you provide any sort of source for this? I am going to have nightmares about this for a long time to come. If this is true....poor little baby.....

Why THE HELL is everyone so shocked by this? It was already said in the original article! It's the basis for SO MANY anti-Carr posts in here, and the basis of equally damning ones on how far midwife research can really take you. Did you think we were making it up??

I can only assume she either has a messianic complex or that she was covering her unlicensed ass by avoiding the 911 call. When I pushed on this, a Carr defender said “there was nothing that a speedy transfer would have accomplished in this case. When a baby is stuck, there is no EMT on the planet who is going to have more skill than the midwife to get it out, and, by the time you make it to a hospital it would be too late anyway” – like that makes the entire home-birth plan for this case any more logical???!!!!!! It just proved my point that controlling your birth plan FROM the hospital is safest.

Carr’s a perfect example of a how easy it is to misrepresent yourself as an experienced, responsible, ethical and competent, CERTIFIED midwife. Ego+$+covering her ass from liability. Sounds like what many have accused OBs of here… Women have the right to choose where to give birth. Exercise it objectively and defensively at least. Learn from this – ask what the plan is for emergencies and keep your cell phone nearby to override the midwife if you insist on doing this from home.

You are letting your rage get the better of you, or perhaps you don't really know much about birth. When a baby gets stuck during the birth, the only option is to work to free the baby and complete the delivery. A speedy 911 call is NOT going to change the outcome. An EMT is NOT going to be able to offer anything greater than what the skilled midwife/OB is already doing. Even having an operating room three doors down is NOT going to help. Once a baby is partially born, there are no other magic answers; you have to finish getting the baby out, and if more than 10 minutes pass, the baby is just not going to make it unless there is a miracle. Maybe you take some personal comfort from thinking that a hospital could have saved this baby, and I think that as mothers who are horrified at this case, it is easy to believe that the right medical team could have saved this baby. However, I honestly believe that the outcome would have been exactly the same regardless of where the birth occurred. This is a risk - thankfully an extremely small risk - that all mothers take when they give birth vaginally.

I think your assessment that Carr was just trying to cover her ass by not calling 911 is wrong, too. In these situations, the only reason homebirth midwives call 911 is precisely TO cover their asses. Everyone knows that it is not going to actually help the baby, it just helps relieve the care providers responsibility. Just because something goes wrong at a birth, it does not mean that the care provider has some huge ego or did something incompetently.

In response to the bolded area above, No , of course the EMT will not be able to magically unstick the poor baby. However, the EMT can start an IV, give oxygen to the mom and transfer the mom to the hospital immediately. THE EMT can notify the hospital to have resources available upon arrival.

This is getting ridiculous, but I am shocked at your inability to imagine something beyond your belief system. How do you know the mom needed an IV? For that matter, how do you know the mother didn't already have an IV? How do you know the mother and/or baby weren't already receiving oxygen? Again, what exactly could the hospital have done to revive the baby? What resources do you think would have changed this situation?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

In response to the bolded area above, No , of course the EMT will not be able to magically unstick the poor baby. However, the EMT can start an IV, give oxygen to the mom and transfer the mom to the hospital immediately. THE EMT can notify the hospital to have resources available upon arrival.

How would any of that have helped the baby? The mom was not hemorrhaging or stroking out. Baby was stuck. No EMT could have fixed that. Karen Carr's resuscitation training and equipment is equal to that of an EMT...an ambu bag, oxygen tank, etc. I agree that 911 should have been called the minute baby wasn't born with the next push, but all they could have done once they got there is stand around and watch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The ultimate blame lies with the parents. First, a home delivery of a breech baby for a 43-year old first time mom. Second, waiting to call 911 after 13 mins of resuscitation. What were they thinking? Obviously, they weren't.

First, her choice.

Second, how would calling 911 earlier have helped?

In response to the bolded area above, No , of course the EMT will not be able to magically unstick the poor baby. However, the EMT can start an IV, give oxygen to the mom and transfer the mom to the hospital immediately. THE EMT can notify the hospital to have resources available upon arrival. The baby would have had a CHANCE.

[Anonymous]

Was in the courtroom. Mom transferred at 38th weeks to KC. Mom was dead set on home birth. No guessing here. Mom was planning on a home birth even when her baby was head down. This mom had life trauma driving her decisions. That is the story. This is fact, as announced by prosecution. She sought out an experienced home birth midwife to attend her head down baby and her breech baby, despite knowing all the risks. This was not an innocent consumer. She came to all the providers involved with the informed choice of birthing her baby at home. End of story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

In response to the bolded area above, No , of course the EMT will not be able to magically unstick the poor baby. However, the EMT can start an IV, give oxygen to the mom and transfer the mom to the hospital immediately. THE EMT can notify the hospital to have resources available upon arrival.

How would any of that have helped the baby? The mom was not hemorrhaging or stroking out. Baby was stuck. No EMT could have fixed that. Karen Carr's resuscitation training and equipment is equal to that of an EMT...an ambu bag, oxygen tank, etc. I agree that 911 should have been called the minute baby wasn't born with the next push, but all they could have done once they got there is stand around and watch.

The mother needed an IV and O2 in preparation for EMERGENCY procedures done in a hospital. The EMT would have transported the mother to the HOSPITAL where attempts would have been made to surgically incise the cervix or take the baby by C-section. There was HOPE for that baby.

I think you are WILLFULLY trying to convince yourself that everything was done for that child. It wasn't .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"You do realize that there are other babies who die and/or are severely brain damaged - yes, even in hospitals - due to getting stuck? Yes, it is tragic, but it has nothing to do with ignorance. In rare cases, babies get stuck and die at birth. Awful but true.


I feel really sorry for you, second poster.
It is your type of ignorant, extreme rhetoric which fed into the birth mother's extreme fear of delivering in a hospital."

to be very, very clear, it was not homebirth rhetoric that made her choose to have a home birth, it was the traumatic death of her mother, in hospital, leaving her a stranded teenager to grow up without a mother, that was the driving factor in her choice. the prosecution made this very clear.

this is probably the reason they agreed to a plea deal. the mother was equally at fault for child endangerment, there is case law addressing this, and they did not want to make her endure questioning on the stand.

I am not sure where your info comes from, perhaps you were one of Ms. Carr's supporters in the court room.

How can you not see that the mother's tragic loss of her own mother caused a perhaps unreasonable fear/suspicion of hospitals?

How can you not see that Ms. Carr's reassurances about her own "experience" level and the safety of homebirth all fed into the mother's decision to birth at home and the resultant horrible outcome for the baby?

Ms Carr, perhaps innocently enough, FED the mother's concerns/paranoia/suspicions.

I am not sure why you think you have the authority to comment on anyone else's experiences or fears. That is simply not your right, as you have no idea how "unreasonable" the mother was. As Americans, we have every right to be suspicious of hospitals, to accept or decline their care, to seek the care of alternative providers, or to seek no care at all. That is the beauty of freedom. You may hold a doctor to be the highest authority in YOUR health care, but not everyone feels the same way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Was in the courtroom. Mom transferred at 38th weeks to KC. Mom was dead set on home birth. No guessing here. Mom was planning on a home birth even when her baby was head down. This mom had life trauma driving her decisions. That is the story. This is fact, as announced by prosecution. She sought out an experienced home birth midwife to attend her head down baby and her breech baby, despite knowing all the risks. This was not an innocent consumer. She came to all the providers involved with the informed choice of birthing her baby at home. End of story.

Whose head was down? The baby's? The above post does not make any sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"You do realize that there are other babies who die and/or are severely brain damaged - yes, even in hospitals - due to getting stuck? Yes, it is tragic, but it has nothing to do with ignorance. In rare cases, babies get stuck and die at birth. Awful but true.


I feel really sorry for you, second poster.
It is your type of ignorant, extreme rhetoric which fed into the birth mother's extreme fear of delivering in a hospital."

to be very, very clear, it was not homebirth rhetoric that made her choose to have a home birth, it was the traumatic death of her mother, in hospital, leaving her a stranded teenager to grow up without a mother, that was the driving factor in her choice. the prosecution made this very clear.

this is probably the reason they agreed to a plea deal. the mother was equally at fault for child endangerment, there is case law addressing this, and they did not want to make her endure questioning on the stand.

I am not sure where your info comes from, perhaps you were one of Ms. Carr's supporters in the court room.

How can you not see that the mother's tragic loss of her own mother caused a perhaps unreasonable fear/suspicion of hospitals?

How can you not see that Ms. Carr's reassurances about her own "experience" level and the safety of homebirth all fed into the mother's decision to birth at home and the resultant horrible outcome for the baby?

Ms Carr, perhaps innocently enough, FED the mother's concerns/paranoia/suspicions.

I am not sure why you think you have the authority to comment on anyone else's experiences or fears. That is simply not your right, as you have no idea how "unreasonable" the mother was. As Americans, we have every right to be suspicious of hospitals, to accept or decline their care, to seek the care of alternative providers, or to seek no care at all. That is the beauty of freedom. You may hold a doctor to be the highest authority in YOUR health care, but not everyone feels the same way.

Umm, you are aware that this is an open forum, any one may comment. My opinions are just as valid as yours.