Southall Guilty

[Bunglie]

I am so very pleased that he has been found guilty on most of the charges. I do not understand how he did what he did to the Clarke family.
What disturbs me is that he has not been struck off. There is still the posibility that he could just be reprimanded.
If he were allowed to continue to practice would you trust him and take your child to him?

Ditto WWW.

FWIW DS ended up having to have his nose cauterised because he suffered so many nose bleeds - thank xxxx Southall wasn't my GP.

I do hope the GMC strikes Southall off but I'm not convinced they will. They'll be under a lot of political pressure from the paediatric lobby ? you must have seen some of the newspaper articles from paediatricians recently claiming that any criticism of their profession threatens child protection work and leaves children vulnerable to abuse. And a long history of monitoring the GMC for my day job does not fill me with confidence in its ability to make the right decision on behalf of patients, frankly.

It was the GMC itself which failed to investigate properly the complaints of parents whose babies had been enrolled onto Southall's trial of experimental ventilators (CNEP). Under pressure from one set of parents the GMC admitted it had messed up but I'm not aware of anything actually happening as a result.
So you end up with a situation where something like 50 babies enrolled on Southall's trial died, with their parents saying they weren't told their children were taking part in an experiment. But that doesn't count as killing babies. While parents of babies who die tragically as a result of serious infections are assumed to be murderers until proved otherwise.

As far as I recall, the original inquiry into the ventilator trial was led by the NHS regional office. It was heavily critical of the way consent was (allegedly) taken and recorded from the parents involved and referred the parent's allegations that their signatures had been forged on consent forms to the GMC. The GMC fumbled it (they admitted this later) and Southall and the other paediatrician involved were reinstated. The hospital trust insisted throughout that everything had been done properly and the parents were wrong. However, the NHS regional inquiry had revealed that the consent forms allegedly signed by the parents had been filled in by nurses, not the consultants leading the trial. So even if the parents had signed (but had forgotten that in the midst of an agonising situation when they were focused on their babies, not NHS record keeping) consent had been wrongly obtained because the procedure and the risks could not have been properly explained. I think I remember claims that the nurses had been under a lot of pressure to recruit babies for the trial. The experimental ventilation system was abandoned but, as usual, it was impossible to show that babies who died would not have died anyway. That's always the get out clause for medical malpractice.

Cos, are you the same person who posted as:

carriemac on Friday, 12 March, 2004 5:53:43 PM
I don't think you should slander Prof Southall here he is a caring a dedicated doctor.

It sounds to me like you have a personal connection to these guys. What's up with the nicname changes?

Not in any way at all defending him but thought I'd just point out to Aloha that the babies in the CNEP trials were not healthy but pre-term critically ill babies.

Only a very slightly higher % died in the CNEP tanks than in the conventional ones.

anyone interested in the local stories go to www.thisisstaffordshire.co.uk and put southall in the search facility.

Willow2, my son also had a couple of minor nose bleeds. What kind of paediatrician doesn't know that babies do have nosebleeds? An unfit, ignorant one.

But Julie, that 'only slightly higher percentage' were real babies who died. Imagine if it happened to you ? woudn't you be outraged to discover that your baby might have had a better chance of survival had the doctors treated him or her properly?
The parents say they weren't told their babies were taking part in an experiment.
I'm just guessing here, but I imagine very few parents would be happy to enrol their extremely vulnerable premature babies into an experiment. I just don't believe many parents in that situation would take any unecessary risk. I suspect the parents were misled about the or that their consent wasn't actually taken.

Cos aka carriemac, I am sorry rhat you felt the need to deceive us. I was willing to hear your argument but I tried hard to understand, but why could you not be honest with us. Are you frightened that because you know/like Southall that I would not respect your views. If your arguments are tailored well and backed up with evidence I will respect them, but I feel a little deceived now, and I am sorry for that. I hope that you can explain to me why you thought that it was necessary to hide your identity. Did you not think I would listen. I asked you for your opinion as I was genuinly interested but I am a bit upset that as I have already said you felt the need to deceive. Is your husband a doctor or you a nurse/doctor as you seem to be very well informed on certain matters and it would be a shame if mumsnet lost your input. But please people do not take kindly to thinking they have been 'tricked' which I would like to think was never your intention.

My question today, (hopefully the last), is

Do you think the GMC are capable and should regulate the doctors. Are they capable of policing themselves, and if not should it be an independent body?

Do you feel able to contact your MP about this and go via that route as to what action should be taken against him?

hang on! has anyone proved that cos and carriemac are the same person? carriemac may have cause to be grateful to Prof. Southall-as a general paediatrician, there must be some children around who he treated successfully!

Name changes aren't necessarily a deliberate attempt to deceive- most of us have changed our names at one time or another, for various reasons.

Cos may just be a new member who started to post yesterday.You may find it unbelievable that two people might have differing views on this topic, but it could happen.

And isn't the whole point of an internet bulletin board anonymity? People can say what they want on here and no-one knows who they are. I don't know who you are, Bunglie,even if you posted your name, address and phone number, I still wouldn't know who you were.

I feel very strongly about Prof.Southall as I have a bit of a ?there but for the grace of God? feeling.

My dd was treated at the hospital where he works, for failure to thrive. This was in the early 90?s at the height of his CNEP trials and covert video surveillance, indeed there were babies in CNEP tanks in the side rooms and for all I know we could have been videoed. Thankfully her first symptoms weren?t respiratory and we weren?t referred to him, but to one of his colleagues.

My dd?s records are littered with references to me as an anxious, stressed parent. We were in hospital on several occasions over a 4-week period for breathing difficulties and the like, all the time she was getting steadily sicker. When she was eventually diagnosed, her specialist said she was very lucky as we may could easily have lost her during the previous night (she would have died in her sleep at home in her cot). What conclusions would he have drawn had she been his patient?

I do however have some misgivings about the CNEP accusations. The parents say that they weren?t given the full picture, that they didn?t give consent. But, as a parent who has been in that position, you do not take in what is being told to you. You physically, mentally and emotionally hand over your child to the people who you think can make them well. I could not tell you what I was told about the procedures and surgery my dd had, what I signed for, what the risks were. In those first few days and hours its a blur. I am the type of person who needs to know all the details, but I didn?t have a clue. It may be that the parents were misled, it may be that the hospital just weren?t careful enough to properly explain the risks to emotional parents (and that?s not good enough), it may be that the parents just didn?t take it in. I suspect that we might never know.

If he saved your child?s life then you will feel differently about him ? maybe that?s where cos & carriemac are/is. Personally I think he should stop practicing.

The GMC seems like a bit of an Old Boys club to me Bunglie and I don't have a great deal of faith in them.

Ds1 was prone to nosebleeds as a baby. It's even in his Child Health Record book that I'd mentioned it to the HV. It's frightening to think that professionals could assume that this was due to abuse and makes me wonder how many parents would now be put off mentioning this particular problem.

Being autistic, ds1 /didn't/doesn't tell us if he is feeling unwell. We have to guess. This means that at one end of the scale we may take him to the GP when he is fine. At the other end of the scale we may not realise he's ill until he suddenly develops a fever, by which time the infection has really spread. At times I feel as though people must think I have MBPS and at other times that I am neglecting ds1 because I haven't taken him to the GP before things got so bad. Southall and his opinions really do not help.

Well, interesting you should say that tissy: Bunglie couldn't post her name, address or phone no, even if she wanted to because she's subject to a gagging order. Because a court took her children away. The rest of us could post these details if we wanted to, but then, we've got our children with us.

Southall should definitly be struck off, even if he did save some children's lives in the past. These people, Meadows and Southall and I'm sure there are others, have not only done untold damage to families already, but I'm sure they are doing now and will in the future, do even more damage to families and their own profession. I was talking to people in the mother and toddler group and some of them said that for little knocks and nosebleeds and stuff that they would previously have gone to the doctor or the hospital about, just to be on the safe side, they now didn't, because they have begun to be afraid of the medical profession - they are scared of being accused of abuse. Which strikes me as being bloody dangerous, because there could be times when an injury doesn't look serious but is. If the GMC doesn't strike this man off, it will send out a loud and clear message to families that they should continue to be very afraid of the medical profession. And I don't think that that is in anyone's interest, least of all children's.

WWW, I didn't know that Bunglie was the subject of a gagging order, and I'm sorry if my words have caused her any distress, but my point was that the automatic assumption that cos and carriemac must be the same person,because they seem to have similar views, may be false.

Cos only started posting yesterday, and carriemac has loads of postings going back over the last couple of years, I think. If she has posted once in Prof. Southall's defence, why change her name?

Let's not polarise this shall we. What most of the posters here are saying - the Southall was wrong in what he did, and should now face the consequences isn't really so far from cos's "he had a duty of care to report his concerns". I don't think anyone is saying he couldn't voice concerns, the criticism is that he went way beyond merely "voicing concerns" and chose to present a theory as fact, beyond reasonable doubt, and present a court report as medical evidence when he hadn't had access to anything more than a tv programme.

Simillarly I don't dispute carriemac's statement that Prof Southall is "a caring and dedicated doctor". He probably is, and I've no doubt that his original intentions were good. But equally, his own belief in his infallability - that utter conviction that he knew better than anyone else, (and with regard to the CNEP issue could do what he wanted in total disregard of the rules which are in place precisely to provide a conterweight to over-zealous application of experimental treatments), was wrong without doubt. Becoming so blinkered - obsessed even - with seeing abuse, even when it wasn't there - is the reason for the criticism now, not the undoubtedly well-meaning motivations which took him into that line of work in the first place.

Have been searching. Maybe Bunglie has discovered the same posts.

carriemac twins
cos twins

They both have boy/girl twins and a DS aged 6.

There are quite a few posts from carriemac on many threads about accused mothers, and she consistently and vehemently says the mothers are guilty. Cos's husband is a consultant. Which consultant, I wonder?

The weirdest thread I've found though is this one - carriemac posts at 5.57 and cos at 6.06 on Thu Jan 30.

?????????

Mrs Southall?

Ok, I failed to search archived messages for cos, so I'll admit she isn't new, but why change your name mid-thread? Odd.

and if she is that person, aloha, she needs the help and support of Mumsnet as much of any of us, right now.

I think I'll save my sympathy for the real victims.

I am so very sorry if I have jumped to the wrong conclusion re cos and carriemac, but once Sofia had pointed it out I did look back and admit 'jumped' to the same conclusion. Many apologies if I am wrong, perhaps you could tell me cos, are you cariemac? It makes no difference really, you are still entitled to your opinion.

Gillw excellent posting I 100% agree.

Sorry if I upset anyone by taking 1+1=3, I blame Sofia,, I love that blunt Amesican in her. no mincing of words there. But I aplogise if I have upset anyone and I believer VERY strongly that EVERYONE has the freedom of speach, I just like to know who I am talking/ listening to.

Very very very odd. That's what I thought.

In fact I came across that thread before doing an exhaustive search with pen and paper, and I admit it threw me. Maybe that was the intention? I know some people change their names for specific posts and then forget to change back when posting elsewhere but this doesn't look like that.

Cos goes back to 2000, latest post (that I could find) Dec 03 - carriemac's earliest (ditto) was June 01. So split ID for 3 years. WTF?

Bunglie, that's very charitable of you, considering how cos/carriemac's opinion is sometimes worded, and that she appears in the face of all that's happened this week to believe that Prof Southall had some sort of divine right to say what he did - and to go on saying it.

However will shut up about it now.