The following news report on catastrophic
infection acquired in the course of a normal birth is another of many reason
why routine hospitalization, as the norm for healthy
women, should be
reexamined.
This young mother had both legs
amputated mid-thigh and both arms amputated at or above the elbow as a
result of a hospital acquired infection.
This article is particularly interesting to
me, as the hospital identified (Orlando Regional Medical Center - formally
Orange Memorial Hospital) is the same one that I trained in as a student
nurse in 1961, worked in the L&D as a graduate nurse and then was the
planned place of birth for my eldest daughter in 1965.
However, I gave birth to her in the back
seat of our tiny Renault, just as we pulled into the OMH emergency room
driveway. I had been delaying my admission to the hospital until the last
minute, in an effort to avoid the iatrogenic complications associated with
the 'knock'em out, drag'em out' obstetrics of the day, which were routinely
used on every laboring woman, whether or not she wanted them. ==================================================================================
WFTV Channel 9 News ~ Orlando, FL
www.wftv.com/news/6253589/detail.html
January 19, 2006
Woman Becomes Quadruple Amputee After Giving Birth
POSTED: 5:59 pm EST January 19, 2006
January 19, 2006
ORLANDO, Fla. -- A Sanford mother
says she will never be able to hold her newborn because an Orlando hospital
performed a life-altering surgery and, she claims, the hospital refuses to
explain why they left her as a multiple amputee.
The woman filed a complaint against
Orlando Regional Healthcare Systems, she said, because they won't tell her
exactly what happened. The hospital maintains the woman wants to know
information that would violate other patients' rights.
Claudia Mejia gave birth eight and
a half months ago at Orlando Regional South Seminole. She was transported to
Orlando Regional Medical Center in Orlando [formally Orange Memorial
Hospital] where her arms and legs were amputated. She was told she had
streptococcus, a flesh eating bacteria, and toxic shock syndrome, but no
further explanation was given.
The hospital, in a letter, wrote
that if she wanted to find out exactly what happened, she would have to sue
them.
"I want to know what happened.
I went to deliver my baby and I came out like this," Mejia said.
Mejia said after she gave birth to
Mathew last spring, she was kept in the hospital with complications. Twelve
days after giving birth at Orlando Regional South Seminole hospital, she was
transported to Orlando Regional Medical Center where she became a quadruple
amputee. Now she can not care for or hold her baby.
"Yeah, I want to pick him up.
He wants me to pick him up. I can't. I want to, but I can't," she said.
"Woke up from surgery and I had no arms and no legs. No one told me
anything. My arms and legs were just gone."
Her 7-year-old son, Jorge, asks his
mother over and over what happened to her. Neither she nor her husband has
the answer.
"I love her, so I'll always
stick with her and take it a day at a time myself," said her husband,
Tim Edwards.
The couple wants to know how she
caught streptococcus, during labor or after. She doesn't know. She knows she
didn't leave the hospital the same.
"And why, I want to know why
this happened," she said.
Her attorney, Judy Hyman wrote ORHS
a letter saying, according to the Florida statute, "The Patients Right
To Know About Adverse Medical Incidents Act," the hospital must give
her the records.
"When the statute is named
'Patients Right To Know,' I don't know how it could be clearer," Hyman
said.
The hospital's lawyers wrote back,
"Ms. Mejia's request may require legal resolution." In other
words, according to their interpretation of the law, Mejia has to sue them
to get information about herself.
That's the sticking point, the
interpretation of the Patients Right To Know act, a constitutional amendment
Florida voters passed a little more than a year ago.
Mejia's other attorney, E. Clay
Parker, said the hospital is not following the law
"We were forced to file this
and ask a judge to interpret the constitutional amendment and do
right," Parker said.
Mejia hopes the right thing is
done. She said not knowing exactly why it happened is unbearable. She only
hopes she'll be able to soon answer her little boy's question, 'What
happened?'
"He told me everyday, 'What
happened,' and I don't have any answers for that," she said.
ORMC said Mejia is requesting
information on if there were other patients or someone on her floor with the
streptococcus. They said, if they release that to her, that would be a
violation of other patients' rights.