Mother Says Miss. Doctor Refused Care to
Baby Girl Born at 22 Weeks
In a case echoing the tragic story of Britain's Sarah Capewell and son
Jayden, a Mississippi mother says that her neonatologist refused to
help her baby daughter survive because he believed she was too young,
at 22 weeks 4 days gestation, to merit intervention.
Necie Franklin of Flowood, Mississippi, told LifeSiteNews.com (LSN)
that Dr. Kenny Robbins of River Oaks Hospital refused to treat daughter
Jessa Mackenzie after she was born suddenly in May, because she was
three days shy of 23 weeks gestation - at which point he would have
considered treating her at the hospital's Level II neonatal intensive
care unit.
Franklin said that Jessa gasped for breath twice while in her arms, but
was told by nurses that it was "just a reaction" - leading her to
believe the child had died. Only after Jessa had been taken away,
says
Franklin, did she learn that the child still had a heartbeat.
Franklin, who says she has lost a child to a premature birth before,
said it "shocked" her when Robbins said he would not help Jessa breathe.
"I looked at him and said, so you're telling me you're not going to do
anything for my daughter?" said Franklin. She says Robbins
"simply
flat out refused."
"He actually told me this - This is what stuck in my mind most of all
for days afterwards - was that I would be torturing my child to do
something, because she was so little," the mother recalled. "She
weighed just over a pound - which there are children who weigh less
than that, that actually make it."
"They took so long to bring her back to me that she had already passed
away by the time they had brought her back to me," said Franklin.
"I
don't know how many times after she left my sight that she gasped for
breath. And they didn't even put a respirator on her to make her
a
little more comfortable."
She says Jessa's heart beat for about an hour and a half before she
died.
Lori Rushkin, Franklin's niece who was present during the ordeal,
confirmed that Franklin and her family expressly pleaded for treatment
for Jessa, to no avail.
"We all kept saying, 'Why not try? What's the harm in at least
trying?'" Rushkin told LSN in a phone interview. "We
said, 'Look:
miracles happen every day, it's not up to you to determine when a child
lives or dies, it's going to be in God's hands. If you try, and
the
child lives, then that's what she was meant to do.
"And that's when [Robbins] started talking about, 'Well, there's so
many papers that have been written, and literature and books that you
can go through, and see that a baby this young is not going to make
it.'"
Rushkin said she and the other family members felt Robbins' attitude
was "ridiculous."
"What was so bad about at least taking an hour out of his time and
trying to do something for that baby?" she asked.
LSN's multiple attempts to reach Dr. Kenny Robbins for further
information were not answered. However, Dr. Robbins did reply to
Franklin's request for further information, saying that "resuscitation
was not indicated" for Jessa. Only after 23 weeks would parents
be
allowed to choose whether to permit resuscitation, said Robbins,
"because outcomes are very poor in this age range and even those who
survive have a high risk of permanent complications."
Robbins said that the protocol used in Jessa's case was "a universally
accepted one by neonatologists, it is in full compliance with Christian
medical ethics," and that the literature he referenced was "produced by
Catholic ethicists - and you can't get more strict and pro-life
regarding the protection of the unborn and newly born than that."
However, Dr. Paul Byrne, M.D., the Director of Pediatrics and
Neonatology at St. Charles Mercy Hospital in Oregon, Ohio, said he
disagrees.
"There is no specific gestational age at which a baby cannot survive
outside the uterus," Byrne told LSN. While a shorter gestational
age
and lower birth rate increase risk of mortality, Byrne said he has
known of infants as young as 18 weeks' gestation to survive.
The limiting factor that determines whether the doctor could intervene
to help the baby, according to Byrne, is related to whether the baby's
trachea is large enough to allow a 2.5 millimeter tube to be inserted
to aid breathing.
Byrne said that Robbins' use of the term "potentially viable" was "not
the correct approach."
"The baby is living," said Byrne. "We can protect and preserve
the
life of the infant person. A doctor ought not to impose or hasten
death."
Franklin said she felt prompted to share her story after hearing that a
similar tragedy befell British mom Sarah Capewell. Capewell told
media
last month that her son Jayden was refused intervention at 21 weeks 5
days gestation, despite crying and staying alive on his own for two
hours. In that case, doctors cited guidelines offered by the
Nuffield
Council on Bioethics as their reason for refusing treatment.
"Just because they have literature stating that the statistics are that
these children don't usually survive - that's not God in the mix," said
Franklin. "Because he can do anything, and that's what we were
trying
to tell the doctor."
"It needs to be brought to light that people are doing this, that
doctors are doing this, ... and nobody is standing up and telling them,
'You shouldn't do this, you shouldn't play God,'" she said.
River Oaks Hosptial did not return LSN's request for comment.
Contact: Kathleen Gilbert
Source: LifeSiteNews.com
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Date: October 14, 2009
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