To think seven Caesareans in eight years is a recipe for disaster?

[ElizabethG81]

What's happened to this woman is horrific, but surely having so many Caesareans in such a short period of time is recklessness bordering on insanity? www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3615027/Mother-eight-relives-nightmare-waking-C-section-discover-legs-amputated.html

Read what mamadoc has posted - it is by no means clear that the amputations were due to hospital negligence.

Being unconscious in intensive care for 5 days is life-threatening in itself. Critically ill people can develop all sorts of complications that are only ever seen in these patients, because they have been kept alive long enough for them to develop.

I also do not think, from what has been reported, that DVT caused her to need the amputations, that would be highly unusual. It's far more likely due arterial thrombosis, mamadoc says, or to DIC (disseminated intravascular coagulation) - lots and lots of tiny clots forming in blood vessels throughout the body. This causes tissue/organ damage and further major haemorrhage, due to all the clotting factors being used up in the tiny clots. It occurs as a consequence of critical illness/injury, especially when large transfusions have been necessary.

Giles. If you are in a coma you are on ICU. You have one nurse constantly with you and only you! She was monitored the whole time! Where is the incompetence?

How on earth can she say she wasn't checked for 6 hours if she was in a coma. even if the family had been with her and no nurse or doctor approached (and I cannot believe that is the case) she would have been remotely monitored.

as mamadoc says

As Bore says DIC is much more likely in view of the multiple transfusions. It is a recognised complication as literally nothing can be done about it but cross your fingers.

The transfusions were done because of the haemorrhage.

The haemorrhage was because of the placenta accreta.

The placenta accreta is a direct result of a c section.

The more c sections you have the more the risk increases.

Clear?

DIC is basically.........blood clots.

as anyone else we only have the article as it stands to go on.

that and any previous experience of hospitals.

I know from mine that what people say and what thy actually do are different things.

as I stated before, my notes had stated that I was to he regularly checked due to the complications.i had suffered and the chance that my baby was small akd.may tire in.labour.

what actually happened was I was left fir hours the only one who spoke to me was the dinner lady and they failed to pick.up on a partial placental abruption despite me telling them.about the blood when I went to.the toilet hours befire.

even when I was wheeled down (urgently I may add after they realised) I was then abandoned again.and very nearly gave birth alone. thankfully dp had just made it.

I think at times people think.that the nhs never stuffs up but pot care o's more common.than.we think. I believe both sides are more than.perfectly plausible and whatever people think about her choices, she still deserved proper care. if they have that then the hospital won't have to pay out will they.

we will all just have to wait and see

giles. The NHS messes things up plenty of times, but it is still tiny in comparison to the numbers dealt with as a whole.

The daily fail article is doing its usual and is biased and sensationalist (it sells papers) and can't be considered gospel, which is why you need a bit of medical knowledge to sift fact from fantasy.

As upsetting as your own experience was it in no way compares (and I hope things turned out well in the end) with a stay in ICU where you are monitored 1-1.

Sadly the lady made her choices. They were not wise choices and she would have been told that on many occasions. Having multiple c sections because she wanted a large family is not a valid reason for putting her life and health at risk. Many people want what they can't have, and many take the risk to have what they want. Not everyone is lucky. She was just unlucky.

And the point I'm trying to make.is that regardless of choices people make.

they are still entitled to a high standard of care.

if they messed up and it is proven they messed up then whatever risks she took are irrelevant. and I wish her the best of luck in her case should it turn out she has one.

if this does turn.out to be a result of her decisions, well it's still horrific and no one deserves to go through that. peope do silly things all the time but to pay with your legs is still something I'd not wish on my worst enemy. and she should still have access to a high standard if follow up.care in regards to counseling and rehab.

amd those who are judging her choice. well don't worry she won't ever have any more children and her tax credits will not increase.

I wouldn't ever have 8 kids. I do happen. to think.that peope who go mad amd have these huge families are nit making the best decisions.

but as I said I would t wish this on anyone regardless of those decisions and it's a horrid situation all round

What I strongly suspect happened is that the nurses checked her vitals hourly but the doctors were meant to be checking her legs and didn't. I think it's unlikely to have been in the nurses scope, highly trained though they are. I think the surgical team were meant to be checking.

There is no indication they messed up. She bled and was given transfusions. She says she was left for 6 hours. How do you manage than on ICU ? You have a dedicated nurse the whole time.

I've never said she deserves what happened, but she must take some responsibility for her actions and not bleat to a newspaper that consistently sensationalises stories about the NHS.

I personally think the daily fail wants all medical services to be privatised as their readers can afford private medical insurance. Probably a bit paranoid!

Elspeth. What would they check? You can't detect blood clots visually. You need suspicion, pain (primarily) swelling, not easy to spot in larger people. It's only when you get tissue dying and then it's too late.

Anyway I don't think it's a simple DVT as the daily fail say, and as more qualified people have pointed out.

BloomingMarvellous do u tell everyone who's had an accident that it's their fault for risking crossing the road that day and they knew the risks when they drove on the motorway and they shouldn't have gone ahead with an operation without being willing to accept and rare and life-changing injuries. What about women who suffer incontinence from severe tears during vaginal births? Do you tell them 'well you knew the risks you shouldn't have had a baby in the first place'. They all should take responsibility for their actions shouldn't they? Disgusting attitude. Absolutely shameful.

sunny where do I say it's anyones fault? I said op must take responsibility for her choices. That's not blaming her, it's reality. She was told of the risks. She chose to ignore them. Her prerogative. But she chose wrong. Not everything in this world is risk free (very little in fact). It's about weighing up the risks, and her risks were very high.

If I chose to walk along a crumbling cliff edge with signs everywhere saying how dangerous it was, would I be right to demand compensation if I fell?

Are you saying nothing that happens to anyone it their own responsibility? Smokers?

It's an utterly ridiculous argument to talk about crossing a road.

The lady reckons whilst she was her legs were not checked at 1am even though she was in a coma.

metro.co.uk/2016/05/29/woman-ends-up-with-both-legs-amputated-due-to-c-section-complication-5912136/

I think that they noticed diffuse discolouration after 6 hrs. Mind you, I don't know if it would have made any difference if it had been an hour or two earlier if it was that bad.

And I'm also not convinced it could have been prevented. Even if it was noticed after say 2 hrs....it would have been very hard to halt. Especially if there were numerous wee tiny clots. I doubt they could have administered a blood thinner if she'd already been haemorraging in delivery. I'm not at all sure if the doctors could have prevented the outcome.

"The expert in London who is an interventinal radiologist looked at the case and would have done exactly the same technique, belli feels that this is a risk but is under recognised because its not reported in journals. Heather asked Ella whever she would be happy or not if this was written up as a case that could not be published to help inform others in the future, nationally and internationally. Steve said that what people dont do is write things up and when they dont go as planned there are catastrophic consequences.

BoomingMarvellous what your missing is that loosing her legs is not a risk she would have been aware of. I agree with you that the hysterectomy she had was a case of a risk that she would have known about and weighed up and now has to live with. But loosing her legs is not something she would have considered before the CS. It's not something that the DRs explicitly warn you about when you have a CS and it's really unfair to say she lost her legs but she has to take responsibility for her choices and knew the risks when it was something that was completely unforeseeable. You seem to completely lack empathy for this woman.

Just wondering what evidence the NHS will have to provide to say they did the best possible? Is it a log of checks only?

As it seems difficult to prove avoidable from what I have read (no medical knowledge).

Not sure why woman has gone to the press really.

what your missing is that loosing her legs is not a risk she would have been aware of. I agree with you that the hysterectomy she had was a case of a risk that she would have known about and weighed up and now has to live with. But loosing her legs is not something she would have considered before the CS. It's not something that the DRs explicitly warn you about when you have a CS and it's really unfair to say she lost her legs but she has to take responsibility for her choices and knew the risks when it was something that was completely unforeseeable

I don't think thats true. The consent form is quite explicit and thorough as to the risks involved, and it certainly includes the risk of clotting, and the risks of that clotting, that cover a multitude of outcomes up to and including coma and death.

She had many repeated sections in a short period of time. There is no way on earth she wasn't told over and over and over again about the risks, and how they keep on increasing for every section, especially with such short gaps inbetween.
It's as much her own fault as it is anyone elses. She clearly didn't care about the risks involved, she just wanted lots of children.

There are two things here.

One is an ill-advised choice to have 7 sections at all, let alone in 8 years.

Another is a hospital's responsibility to check regularly on ALL post-operative patients, to ensure there is no thrombosis risk.

People are confusing the two. You could be in theatre for something really minor, comparatively speaking, and still need to wear pressure socks and have regular checks. It's basic care. If her notes show that basic care was lacking, then her being a high-risk patient (by her own choice is not relevant) just makes that failure in care worse, because she needed better care and more rigorous checks than someone less vulnerable.

If they didn't care for her properly - and it's a big if - then she has every right to want compensation. She's lost two legs. She is seriously disabled. If adequate care might well have prevented that, then what she was in hospital for is not relevant.

its a tough one, and seems that she made some silly decisions (based on not enough information as to why she chose to have CSs)

But if you had a skier or a motorcycle rider in an accident in the same situations, coma etc, would you have sympathy even though you could argue that its their own fault because their actions 'got them there'

I don't think people are confusing the two, I think they are saying that if she hadn't made her choices, it wouldn't have happened in the first place.

Plus I think somehow who obviously wilfully ignored medical advice time after time isn't a very reliable person to identify whether mistakes were made or not, and whether those mistakes if any had any actual effect on the outcome.

Just because someone is in the Fail stating that its the hospitals fault they lost their legs doesn't mean its actually true.

Sunny She would absolutely have been made aware of the risks of a severe haemorrhage because it is a known complication of c section, and a risk that increases which each one. She would also have been told that haemorrhage could have resulted in death and everything in between. My sister had a second csection and was told that.

There is a large section of society that just can't except that you have to take responsibility for your actions. She seems intent on blaming everyone and not accepting she has to accept some of the blame, if not all. I'm sorry she has been disabled in this way, as anyone would be, but she behaved recklessly and I (like Hodoor) am certain she would have been told many, many times to stop having children because the risk to her health was too great. She chose to carry on despite the implications for herself and her family. Why should the NHS and us (as taxpayers) pay for her recklessness?

Empathy has nothing to do with it, although honestly I have far more sympathy with the 2 little girls paralysed in a road rage incident. They really were innocent victims.

She says herself they were through choice.

As I have now said three times the word 'choice' is one which is misleading, even if she used the word herself.

A HCP can strongly advise against a VB, but people can still phrase this as a choice, even though it was not much of one.

having a traumatic labour with your first baby frequently happens and some people opt for c section and others choose to have counselling and a natural birth. They are not compulsory. I had a traumatic first birth but weighed up safety and had a normal second delivery.

Well aren't you just the amazing one. Do you have a clue?

You do realise that the official NICE guidelines on the subject, say that counselling might work for some women, however since there is a time frame for many women if they are already pregnant this might not work, the quality of counselling across the country and access to that are both incredibly patchy and on top of that, they don't actually know what counselling works - stating as part of that, that some methods might actually be more harmful than helpful - and more research needs to be done in the area. Therefore as a result they feel that an ELCS should also be an option for HCPs to offer to patients for their sake of their mental health - which is also health (the clue being the word 'health' in mental health)

So unless you are more qualified and have access to some research that NICE don't I suggest you stop peddling shit which is ignorant, judgemental, adds to stigma and just generally is anti-women and anti-evidence based medicine.

Thatsmystapler. I agree. I would not blame a cyclist, skier or anyone similar who had a serious accident. But I would think they would be open to criticism if they refused to wear a helmet and leathers, broke the speed limit at 100 mph, and rode a bike that they knew had just failed its MOT.

I too think that the daily fail and a woman who behaved in a wilfully reckless way are not the most reliable sources of information Hodoor!