What do you think of the $55 million settlement in the Johns Hopkins malpractice case?

[Anonymous]

We have no idea what the circumstances of the case are, so we can't really speculate. Maybe all the ORs were booked up, maybe she attempting a vagina birth, maybe a unicorn came from the sky, who knows. Either way, this will be appealed and hopefully saner heads will prevail.

[Anonymous]

How can anyone have an opinion on this? There isn't enough information in this article to even understand what happened to her son and why.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What does the home birth have to do with the hospital waiting 2 hrs to give her the c-section? Two totally different things.

If she was in the hospital in the first place, the operating room could have been prepped faster. The staff would have been ready for her.

You take these risks when you attempt home birth. Why would anyone want to do a home birth?!?!?

Remind me to make sure to have my car accident or heart attack at a hospital next time; after all, if they wait to treat me, it's my fault for not being there in the first place.

You probably would not sue the doctor if you died because of a heart attack.

We have friends who are cardiologists. They rush but sometimes 15 minutes is not enough time.

I'm not as familiar with obgyn but I do know I had to wait 4 hours for my epidural. Two moms next to me took 8 hours for an epidural.

Maybe the anesthesia team was tied up. You can't do a c section without anesthesia.

[Anonymous]

Yeah, I if we don't know what the birth defect was, then how can we judge? I can't think of a birth defect that would be caused by delaying birth. If the birth defect was there anyway, then why does an extra 2 hours matter? And how could the ob know the situation if she wasn't his patient?

Even if the hospital was at fault, the monetary award seems very out of line.

[Anonymous]

By law, nurse midwives in Maryland practice in collaboration with a physician so that in the event of an emergency, that physician is available to do a admit the patient to a hospital and can do a stat c/s. The midwife in question in this case was a CNM who was practicing WITHOUT the required physician agreement. She has since lost her license from the board of nursing for this violation and others.

When an illegally practicing midwife (either a nurse midwife practicing under the radar like this or a professional midwife who practices entirely illegally) runs into trouble at home, they either call 991 or put the woman in their car and literally dump them off at the local ER. They can't participate in the care or even give a history for fear of being prosecuted. The admitting hospital gets NO history---no fetal monitoring history, no pregnancy history, no labor history, nothing. They get a woman, who appears to be pregnant at some unknown point in her labor. The logical thing that happens (and I'm sure happened in this case) is that the physicians get this woman on a stretcher and have to begin to piece together exactly what is going on. They do a vaginal exam, put her on the fetal monitor to see exactly what is going on with the baby, etc. This takes time---you don't even know if you have a non-reasurring fetal heart tracing and need a c/s until you actually have ANY fetal heart tracing. NO-ONE is going to do a c/s within 10 minutes on a woman when they don't even have proof that anything is wrong with the baby. For all they know, the baby is fine and the woman is in the beginning of labor). They aren't going to cut open a woman on arrival without any evidence that they need to (I am 150% sure that this woman arrived without any medical records from the midwife). The physicians in this kind of case are SCREWED if they do (c/s a woman the moment she steps foot in the ER and without ANY evidence that she needs a c/s) and SCREWED if they don't (actually take the time to evaluate the situation). Plus, I would bet the farm that this woman did not want a c/s on arrival. I'm sure she drug her feet until the last possible moment.

[Anonymous]

I thiink when she left the home to deliver at the hospital, she knew it would be to have a c-section.
I even think it is not so complex to know she needed one

[Anonymous]

Anger at her home birth gone wrong, vengeance at the wrong people. Sadly the "home birthing community" doesn't have 55 million dollars.

[Anonymous]

Hopkins is awesome. Vascular surgeon saved my son. So sorry this happened to anyone, but unless you know all of the details, this should not be on DCUM.

[Anonymous]

DH is a surgeon. He isn't obgyn but if often takes hours for his operations to get started. I am actually very familiar with hospitals and specifically JHU.

There's a big difference between scheduled surgery and emergency surgery, though: scheduled surgeries can get bumped because the required lab work isn't present, because the patient ate when they weren't supposed to, because the anesthesia consult wasn't done timely, etc., etc. But there are always ORs that are pretty much ready to go for emergencies (not set up fro that surgery, obviously, but clean, prepped, stocked).

I'm not commenting on this specific case, because I don't know all the facts.

[Anonymous]

[b]

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, I if we don't know what the birth defect was, then how can we judge? I can't think of a birth defect that would be caused by delaying birth. If the birth defect was there anyway, then why does an extra 2 hours matter? And how could the ob know the situation if she wasn't his patient?

Even if the hospital was at fault, the monetary award seems very out of line.

I'm not a doctor, but yes, one can suffer long-term disabilities, if birth is delayed. I believe it's related to not having enough oxygen which causes your brain cells to die.

Anyway, it is entirely possible to have an originally healthy baby become disabled during birth.

[Anonymous]

I'm not a doctor, but I did stay at a holiday inn express last night.

[Anonymous]

Why are they calling it a birth defect? Do they mean a birth injury?

[Anonymous]

I am surprised they don't call it a birth injury as well. I immediately thought the baby might have suffered from hypoxia/asphyxia either during the pushing process or intrauterine, which can lead to devastating brain damage. I have friends overseas who have children with absolutely no ability to breathe on their own, talk, eat, toilet... etc. They are in a vegetative state. Yet, none of them seemed to have sued the hospital. (In some cases I wish they would!)

[Anonymous]

Yet birth defect rates are not decreasing, although c-section rates have skyrocketed. Maybe people should accept that there are no guarantees in life, and especially in childbirth.

[Anonymous]

Here is a more detailed article:

http://www.wbaltv.com/news/maryland/baltimore-city/Jury-awards-family-55M-in-medical-malpractice-suit-against-Hopkins/-/10131532/15277958/-/98elrgz/-/index.html

The disability is severe brain damage (2 yo similar to a 4 mo). According to the article (the family, not Hopkins) an emergency surgery was ordered, but took 2 hours. I agree with the PP above that it was probably a combination of 1) all surgery rooms were filled with either scheduled or emergencies and 2) needing to take stats and prep the woman.

Frankly, a woman in birth **is not** the most pressing emergency. In Baltimore, plenty of near-fatal gun shot wounds come in every night. Some worse than others. Her life was not at risk and in theory she would not have been the top triage. On a bad night it may have taken 2 hours to get her into an emergency surgery room.