Archie Battersbee case

[whynotwhatknot]

I was just wondering why we're not allowed to post about this case-the deletion message mentioned it was ongoing so wouldnt be fair to the family

Charlie gards case was on going and there was numerous threads about it

Anyway if this stands maybe we can discuss

I think the vasopressin saga could still be to do with the CLC's wider agenda. They want to play for time in the knowledge that the longer this goes on, the more likelihood there is that Archie's system will just give up. They will then claim it as a victory because they stopped the ventilator being turned off.

And the latest update.. going back to the Courts not being told everything...something about sodium levels so course it's got the Army going again with the Doctors are liars and he is progressing blah...

@XenoBitch am I right in thinking that they can overrule the DNAR at any time. I had a child who had one and mum overrode it at the last minute. PICU were not very happy as he had reached his threshold of care and they did t have a bed. But mum forced it.

I agree.

The initial agenda - as stated by the Christian legal group - was to change the definition of death in the UK. This didn’t succeed but if they manage to NOT have the ventilation stopped, against the doctors’ stated recommendations, this will be considered a victory.

i think Hollie is agreeing because it draws the process out more and potentially because she thinks Archie can make some vasopressin himself (he can’t).

I don’t know how much it would normally cost to have a lawyer argue this case in court but presumably 10s, maybe ?100s of thousands. The Christian group are hoping to set a new precedent in law.

It also demonstrates how little they care about Archie and his family. Watching him pass catastrophically large amounts of urine, progressing to hypovolaemic shock from fluid loss would be horrific.

That Hollie also seems to want this is, I think, a testament to her impaired decision making at the moment.

I think only the court could override it as they made the order. Though I suppose if that miracle that CLC keep talking about happened and he woke up and started talking the doctors could decide to override it anyway. But obviously it won't.

I'm wondering about the professional position of the barristers in this case and the solicitors instructing them (they're not being instructed directly by the CLC). Devereux seemed to be increasingly uncomfortable with the arguments he was having to put forward last week, especially the ones about Archie's dignity not mattering because he's unaware of what is happening, and the one about stopping vasopressin. I know it's all in the finest traditions of the bar etc to put forward arguments you don't personally agree with, but Devereux must know that his client is lying either when she says she accepts Archie can't survive or when she pops up on TV etc saying that she doesn't accept that. At some point it becomes professionally wrong to make out your client is telling the truth when you know they aren't.

I also wonder whether that is why Ian Wise (who did the hearing before Hayden) isn't doing this one - there was some discussion at the hearing indicating that Devereux had been briefed at very short notice. Could it be that Wise thought he was professionally compromised?

Could it be that Wise thought he was professionally compromised?

or the whole circus of it all was just unpalatable?

As I said earlier in the thread, it sometimes happens that a client to say one thing in court (with the benefit of sensible legal advice from their lawyers) It is often a moment of clarity clients have. However when they go back to their family / friends outside the pressure of court and the benefit of sensible advice, they often change their minds and take a completely different position (then complain that their barrister put forward their original position even though that was their instructions )

A barrister and/or solicitor will only be able to withdraw from a case after accepting instructions in very limited circumstances (for example they know their client has lied) A barrister can't refuse a brief.

Yeah definitely seems to be the case. Now complaining that no new medical advice can be submitted by them because they've made it a best interest case. But isn't that partly what they wanted? It feels surreal and anyone commenting on what was said in court is deleted and banned.

Barristers certainly can refuse a brief if they are acting pro bono.

The issue here is that Hollie hasn't just told her family that she thinks Archie can recover, she's told the world. If she's telling her lawyers that she's just lying every time she pops up on TV, fine, but it must be getting increasingly awkward, especially when she changes her instructions and her versions of events.

Sorry, my point was regarding influence. Obviously she hasn't just been telling her friends /family different views, but what I meant was the outside the influence of court and her lawyers, with her friends / family egging her on, she changes her mind / expresses a different view. This isn't actually massively unusual in emotional court proceedings (obviously telling the world bit is!)

So dignity for all have been tagged in a post
On the Facebook page thing showcasing all the personal messages the admin was sent from the admins of the army account.. it's quite telling .

What an absolute shit show. On both sides

@SunflowerGardens completely agree. It's absolutely disgusting. Neither side come out looking good.

It's like people have forgotten there is an actual 12 year old boy at the heart of this.

Since there are posters here who understand these things, please may I ask a question about diabetes insipidus?

I'd always thought that the body would only produce urine from what fluids were put in, so I'm confused about the remarks around "catastrophic amounts" ... is it that the condition causes the body to lose it's own normal fluids too if that makes sense?

It's not a direct relationship - water that you drink doesn't go straight into your kidneys and come out as wee. It gets absorbed into your bloodstream, and as blood passes through your kidneys, some of the water (and salts and other chemicals) is filtered out as urine. Exactly how much urine, and how concentrated it is, depends on a number of things like your blood pressure, the concentration of various salts in the blood, and hormones like ADH (vasopressin). So if you drink loads of water, your blood pressure temporarily rises, your blood becomes slightly more dilute, so you make a larger volume of more concentrated urine. At night, you may not drink for 8+ hours, so your body increases ADH secretion and you make a smaller volume of more concentrated urine.

If you have no ADH, then your kidneys cannot concentrate urine, so they just continue to pee out lots of dilute urine regardless of what is going in. People who are conscious can manage this to a degree by simply drinking gallons, but obviously this isn't possible for Archie (or many other patients with brain injuries in ICU). So basically fluid gets sucked out from everywhere to try to maintain balance - from the blood first, then from all the fluid around tissues in our body and eventually from inside cells themselves. The concentration of sodium in the blood can rise dangerously high, causing arrhythmias and seizures (though given the state of his brain I'm not even sure he can have seizures), cells all around the body will get damaged, the blood pressure will drop and they will die. Vasopressin also has a direct effect on increasing blood pressure, so without it the BP will also fall. It would take longer than stopping ventilation.

I hope that makes some sense ?

@Puzzledandpissedoff this is from the nhs Diabetes insipidus is caused by problems with a chemical called vasopressin (AVP), which is also known as antidiuretic hormone (ADH).
AVP is produced by the hypothalamus and stored in the pituitary gland until needed.
The hypothalamus is an area of the brain that controls mood and appetite.
The pituitary gland is located below your brain, behind the bridge of your nose.
AVP regulates the level of water in your body by controlling the amount of urine your kidneys produce.
When the level of water in your body decreases, your pituitary gland releases AVP to conserve water and stop the production of urine.
In diabetes insipidus, AVP fails to properly regulate your body's level of water, and allows too much urine to be produced and passed from your body.
Basically your brain tells your kidneys to stop making urine; if you have a kidney issue or Brian injury you can develop diabetes insipidus where they never stop producing urine. That's what the vasopressin does

Gah - first section should say "larger volume of more DILUTE urine" when you drink more.

Thank you very much, SockQueen and HuffleWoof ... I just knew someone would be able to put me right

Archie’s diabetes insipidus is really bad as well. Presumably because there is absolutely no ADH hormone because his posterior pituitary gland is destroyed, along with the rest of his brain stem.

Older children who present with pituitary hormone depletions usually have some residual function, so their hormone tests don’t show zero levels, just low levels. They’re still called X hormone deficient and still need replacement

In live children who have it it’s true that, before diagnosis, they drink crazy amounts and do things like wake in the night to gulp directly from the tap 😀Actual diagnosis requires bringing them in and deliberately depriving them of water and demonstrating that their urine remains inappropriately dilute.

However, even in hospital where he is receiving continuously iv fluids and replacement hormone Archie is still producing large enough urine volumes that his BP can drop suddenly to the extent that PICU has called an emergency call on a few occasions (as per one of the hearings).

It all sounds very unstable and I don’t think Hollie appreciates this at all.

Taking the tube out could be so gentle- he won’t even gasp, because that’s a brain stem response and he has none - and his heart would just slow then stop. As a pp said, this could be done with his family around him, Hollie cuddling him. Instead they want to watch him dehydrate to death (and/or arrest because of abnormal electrolytes).

It's an awful decision for any parent to make. But she's quite saying to let him die naturally. The life support is keeping him alive. He's brain stem dead. His brain is rotting and collapsing into his spine.

The boy she talks about he died in April. He's just a shell. They need to let him go. She says he squeezed her hand but there's no proof of this just a picture holding her two fingers.

She says he opens his eyes but are they fully open? People do sleep with they're eyes open. It's possible for someone on life support even if brain stem dead.

She says he opens his eyes but are they fully open? People do sleep with they're eyes open. It's possible for someone on life support even if brain stem dead

There is no spontaneous eye opening. His eyelids are lifted by the nurses to put drops in to stop his corneas from drying out. Eye lids are protective of the eyes and the positioning of them over the eyes is deliberate. If Hollie lifted them she could make the eyes appear open.

Everything Hollie says about what Archie does Needs to be approached with scepticism.

She said he:
• gripped her hand yet he has no functioning peripheral motor nerves so his muscles won’t move
• was looking at his teddy and the video she posted to confirm it was horrific - fixed, dilated, unresponsive pupils with filmy corneas. Dead eyes
• has changes to his heart rate and BP when she goes in yet EEGs have shown no brain wave activity. This included a provoked EEG where he was played his family’s voices, favourite music, friends’ voices, recordings from MMA athletes eyes he admired and there was still no response.

thankyou everyone for your explnataions and theories

I think his poor mum feels guilty/responsible because she was in the house when hung himself. She has continually said that she thinks it was an online challenge. But, sadly, he really could have been depressed especially if he was a child with emotional/behavioural challenges (as pp mentioned school behaviour) dc like this can be more prone to suicide. the on line challenge has yet to be established & I would have thought the police would have searched all his media accounts to see if there was any evidence as they would have pursued the organisers or what ever legally.
It was not her fault but this could explain why she needs to fight to keep her son "alive"
Can you imagine what is circling in her brain endlessly
The poor family being abused & used by extremists & brainwashing an emotionally fragile & vulnerable woman