BACKGROUND: "The malpractice lawsuit case her family has brought against Boston's 'Children's Hospital' - is under way. As the Boston Globe reports...."Justina Pelletier was 14 in 2013 when she landed in a locked psychiatric unit at Boston Children’s Hospital, temporarily a ward of the state. Her parents stood accused of medical child abuse as they clashed with the hospital’s doctors over her diagnosis and care......... (Justine, now 21, and her parents accuse Children’s and its providers of ignoring in 2013 the treatment advice of her doctors at Tufts Medical Center, where Justina was being treated for mitochondrial disease, a group of rare genetic disorders that affects how cells produce energy. The family also accuses the hospital and its providers of violating their civil rights by barring the Pelletiers from seeing their daughter, and by warning the state would take custody of Justina if they didn’t consent to the doctors’ treatment plan.)"
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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Doctors
and caregivers at the hospital suspected that some or part of
Pelletier’s symptoms might be psychologically driven, or a type of
somatoform disorder.
Patients
with such disorders tend to manifest real physical symptoms, such as
pain or fatigue, but without any underlying explanation supported by
physical, biological or medical reasoning. Doctors at Children’s Hospital believed Pelletier would benefit from intensive psychological treatment and therapy. But
Pelletier’s parents were resistant to psychotherapy, doctors said, and
insisted that their daughter instead suffered from mitochondrial
disease, a chronic, very rare and incurable condition characterized by
mutated cells." The
diseased cells become unable to completely burn food and oxygen to
generate enough energy for a body to live. The condition is often
inherited During
Pelletier’s hospitalization, she and her parents were forbidden from
speaking about health issues, physical ailments or anything medical
related. Even dandruff and ingrown toenails were off limits. If they
ventured there in conversation, the call would end abruptly, Pelletier
said. Pelletier
said her constipation worsened while she was hospitalized. Staff would
make her sit on the toilet for extended lengths of time, she said. They
also wanted her to push herself in her wheelchair, but she felt so weak
that she could not. She would be left to sit, unmoved, sometimes for
entire days, she said,. Pelletier said she did not feel encouraged by the staff. “They were just being mean about it,” she said. She was scared all the time, missed her family desperately and felt like no one at the hospital believed her. “I just wanted to go home,” Pelletier said. “It was really hard being away from my family.”
STORY: "'I don't have any pain anymore': Justina Pelletier takes stand in Boston Children's Hospital lawsuit," by reporter Tonya Alanez, published by The Boston Globe on January 27, 2020.
GIST: In
a small, wavering voice, she chronicled the nine months she spent in
lockdown at age 14 against her parent’s wishes after doctors accused the
couple of interfering with her treatment. She recalled the pain of
being taken from her parents, leaving her with a separation anxiety so
intense that she still sleeps with her mother. Her nightmares are
frequent.
The terror always revolves around being removed from her parents, she said. “I would get taken away,” she said, describing her fear. Now 21, Pelletier said that since having her colon removed in February 2018, her hospital visits have subsided. “I don’t have any pain anymore,” Pelletier said. Pelletier’s
testimony came one week into the civil trial in Suffolk Superior Court
against the renowned pediatric hospital and four of Pelletier’s doctors
and caregivers. Linda
and Lou Pelletier were locked in constant dispute with doctors and
other caregivers at the hospital over their daughter’s diagnosis and
treatment. Relations at the hospital grew so acrimonious that the
Pelletiers lost custody of their daughter after doctors and state child
welfare officials concluded that they were acting against her best
interests and interfering in her treatment. It
was excruciating stomach pain from severe constipation that prompted
her and her mother in January 2013 to travel from their West Hartford, Conn., home to Children’s Hospital, in an ambulance, in the snow, to
seek treatment. Less
than a month into her stay there, on Valentine’s Day 2013, her parents
were whisked away from the hospital by men clothed in black, she told
the jury.
“I didn’t get to see them anymore,” she said. Pelletier had never spent a night away from home without her mother. “All of a sudden I just didn’t get to see her," she said. The hospital’s only explanation: “They said that I’d get better faster, but they really didn’t say why,” she said.
Medical
notes, records, and e-mails between caregivers describe Pelletier’s
parents as difficult, disruptive, belligerent, and accusatory, according
to court records. The
Pelletier case has driven headlines, ramped up an unlikely coalition of
advocates and stands, to some, as a symbol of doctors’ powers to
override parental rights. After
Pelletier’s parents were banned from the hospital, it would be a week
before she would see them again. From then on, they were allowed once a
week supervised visits on Fridays. Phone calls were limited to 20
minutes per week, always with someone listening in.
Doctors
and caregivers at the hospital suspected that some or part of
Pelletier’s symptoms might be psychologically driven, or a type of
somatoform disorder. Patients
with such disorders tend to manifest real physical symptoms, such as
pain or fatigue, but without any underlying explanation supported by
physical, biological or medical reasoning. Doctors at Children’s Hospital believed Pelletier would benefit from intensive psychological treatment and therapy. But
Pelletier’s parents were resistant to psychotherapy, doctors said, and
insisted that their daughter instead suffered from mitochondrial
disease, a chronic, very rare and incurable condition characterized by
mutated cells.
The
diseased cells become unable to completely burn food and oxygen to
generate enough energy for a body to live. The condition is often
inherited. During
Pelletier’s hospitalization, she and her parents were forbidden from
speaking about health issues, physical ailments or anything medical
related. Even dandruff and ingrown toenails were off limits. If they
ventured there in conversation, the call would end abruptly, Pelletier
said. Pelletier
said her constipation worsened while she was hospitalized. Staff would
make her sit on the toilet for extended lengths of time, she said. They
also wanted her to push herself in her wheelchair, but she felt so weak
that she could not. She would be left to sit, unmoved, sometimes for
entire days, she said,. Pelletier said she did not feel encouraged by the staff. “They were just being mean about it,” she said. She was scared all the time, missed her family desperately and felt like no one at the hospital believed her. “I just wanted to go home,” Pelletier said. “It was really hard being away from my family.” These
days, she has discovered horseback-riding therapy. She thrives in the
saddle and now rides competitively, and it’s not unusual for her to take
winning ribbons home, usually blue and red. “I love it,” she said during one of the few times her face lit up on the stand. When Pelletier’s testimony came to an end, her father helped her down from the witness stand. With
his arms hooked under her armpits, Lou Pelletier supported his
daughter’s weight as she half-shuffled, half limped across the courtroom
back to her empty wheelchair beside her mom."
The entire story can be read at:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/01/27/metro/i-dont-have-any-pain-anymore-justina-pelletier-takes-stand-boston-childrens-hospital-lawsuit/
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog;
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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