A gynecologist in Scotland was held responsible for decapitating a baby during a botched delivery at the end of a 24-hour shift four years ago.
Dr. Varishnavy Laxman was found guilty of medical misconduct for her actions at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee, Scotland on March 16, 2014.
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According to The Guardian, the 43-year-old gynecologist should have performed an emergency Caesarean section on a 30-year-old woman, who was about to give birth to a premature baby 25 weeks into her pregnancy. However, Laxman instead continued ahead with a natural delivery.
The attempted delivery happened near the end of a 24-hour shift for Laxman, reports the Sun.
She started her shift at 8:30 a.m. the previous day. At 6 p.m., she went home for five hours and went back to the hospital at 11 p.m. She was told about the patient coming in at 2 a.m., and was asked to come into the delivery room at 8:30 a.m.
During the delivery, Laxman rushed the woman to push the baby and tried to help by adding traction to the baby’s legs. But during this process, the baby’s limbs became detached from the torso. The head remained in the mother’s womb.
According to a tribunal, the baby’s head was trapped in the mother’s cervix at the time, causing it to be removed from the rest of his body. The panel said the patient’s cervix was only 4 centimeters dilated, which Laxman should have known was “insufficient” to deliver the baby safely.
Two other doctors in the delivery room performed the emergency c-section to remove the head. They then re-attached it to the body so the mother could hold him.
Laxman denied doing anything wrong and told a tribunal in Manchester she believed the baby would have died if they performed a C-section.
Still, panel chairman Tim Bradbury said her actions were “increasingly desperate” during the delivery. Bradbury said Laxman never gave sufficient reason why she believed the C-section would not have saved the baby’s life.
“The decision to proceed with vaginal delivery represented a failure in her clinical decision-making on the evidence available to her at the time,” Bradbury said.
“Her conduct set in train a course of events which ultimately resulted in the decapitation of Baby B and to this extent contributed to that decapitation,” Bradbury continued. “But for Dr Laxman’s error of judgement in this regard, the decapitation would not have occurred.”
“I would never use the word stillborn, he was not stillborn he was decapitated,” said the mother, who was only identified as Patient A during the tribunal. “I was pregnant, my first pregnancy I wasn’t sure what was going on and I was told it was the safest place possible. Nobody explained the plan or risks associated. It was like disorganised chaos and I was scared.’”
The patient also said she does not forgive Laxman.
The tribunal will decide if Laxman can continue practicing at a later date.
