Baby died after mother was denied a caesarean
She’d begged for the op... but NHS ‘said it was too expensive’
A CORONER has warned that the NHS is risking future deaths after hearing how a baby died when his mother’s pleas for a caesarean section were ignored apparently because of costs.
Kristian Jaworski was starved of oxygen during a prolonged delivery when doctors insisted on a natural birth and tried to pull him out with forceps.
He suffered severe brain damage and died five days after his birth at North Middlesex University Hospital in Tottenham, North London, in 2015.
His mother Tracey Taylor, 32, had repeatedly pleaded for a caesarean because of complications during the birth of her first child Sebastian, three-and-a-half years earlier.
She was told she had a narrow birth canal and should not deliver naturally, but her warnings were ignored.
An inquest last month into Kristian’s death found that he would be alive today if his mother had been given a planned caesarean.
Senior coroner Andrew Walker has now written to the Department of Health to raise concerns about women’s access to caesareans.
His report into the death of Kristian found there appeared to be a financial reason for favouring a natural birth ‘that needed to be rebutted’.
But the hospital said cost had not been a consideration.
Yesterday Miss Taylor, from Enfield, North London, said she was treated like an ‘overanxious woman’ when she voiced her concerns about a natural birth.
She told Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘I don’t want anyone else to go through the same thing. I feel I was treated like an over-anxious woman who was too frightened to give birth, when that was never terminology that I used. I went in there with a reason which is something that a woman wouldn’t just make up. I was told I had a narrow birth canal.’
Miss Taylor, who is 5ft 3in, told how her eldest son Sebastian needed a forceps delivery despite weighing 5lb.
She said: ‘When my first child was born it was quite a traumatic experience. He was born with forceps and I was told, while still in the delivery suite, that I had a narrow birth canal and that if I had any subsequent children I would have to have a caesarean.
‘When I became pregnant with Kristian it was something I highlighted from the beginning with my GP and then with my midwives.’
But Mr Walker’s report states that Miss Taylor’s medical notes made no reference to the fact she had been advised to have a caesarean. Miss Taylor said: ‘When I was first sent into hospital, I was sent home twice even though the second time I was upset and crying and saying, “I’ve had a problem before, please can I stay?” They wouldn’t let us stay.’
Mr Walker noted that doctors had agreed to take Miss Taylor to theatre following problems with the labour and Kristian having an abnormal heart rate, with the consultant obstetrician being of the view that this was for a caesarean delivery.
But ‘in theatre, the registrar made an assessment of Miss Taylor’s birth canal and [concluded] trial of instruments would be appropriate’.
Delivery was then attempted with a ventouse, followed by forceps, before a caesarean was deemed necessary.
Kristian was born in a poor condition and Miss Taylor, a funeral arranger, did not get to see him because her epidural had not worked properly and she was operated on under general anaesthetic.
She added: ‘I didn’t get to hold him until ... the last day. But I did get to see him and spend time with him.’
Mr Walker concluded: ‘The cause of death is likely to have been asphyxia as a consequence of prolonged and extended instrumental delivery.’ In his report to the Department of Health, he warned ‘there is a risk that future deaths will occur unless action is taken’.
He said there was a ‘presumption in favour of vaginal delivery based partly on cost’ – although the hospital denies this was the case.
Miss Taylor’s solicitor Paul McNeil said: ‘The coroner heard evidence from the midwives and obstetricians who cared for Tracey and he also had his own expert evidence.
‘The expert ... indicated that a factor in the decision to perform a vaginal delivery was related to cost.’
According to the Department of Health, the average cost of all standard deliveries is £1,985, while for the all caesareans it is £3,781.
The hospital’s director of medicine Dr Cathy Cale said: ‘Although the coroner did not find the trust negligent, we have accepted liability for Kristian’s death because we accept we made mistakes.’
But she added: ‘There was and never is any question of cost being a consideration.’
‘Starved of oxygen’