Dad Fights Hospital to Keep Baby on Life Support

I suspect there is much more to this story than is let on. If the child were as the dad claims, why not trach him and g-tube him and send him on his merry way? The fact that the child is still in the hospital at 1 year of age and has not been able to leave speaks volumes.

FWIW, It's disheartening to read that one thinks withdrawing support is "murder". I spend much of my time at work with "chronics". These kids are miserable.. frequent IV sticks, lab draws, bagging/suctioning, narcotic withdrawl, day in/day out in a hospital bed...what kind of life is that. It is NOT! It is very emotionally draining to take care of these children and it is almost a relief to hear when one has passed as they are free of all the **** I had to put them through just to keep them alive. I think most my of co-workers and myself are in agreement that if we ever required such medical care as these kids do, we would have wanted the vent turned off waaaay before it ever got to that point.

I was not aware of this. How disgusting! I think the government should just stay out of health care. It is murder to kill a baby when the parents dont want them taken off life support and Heaven help those who pull the plug, cause it sure as heck wont be me!

Why do you continue to work in this area if it is so hard for you? I know it is hard but I wonder if maybe it might be time for a change for you personally? Not trying to tell you what to do, just thinking aloud.

So much of a person's view of sickness is based on one's religious views. Some religions view sickness as God's punishment, working out of one's karma from a previous life, God's will, whatever. Very, very hard to be totally objective when it comes to this topic. I do know that money and quality of life matter, but they are not the whole picture. I have no easy answers, either.

When the elderly in nursing homes keep falling and getting pneumonia and UTI's, the doctors start advocating for not treating them after the first bout or 2. That's what happened with my relative. Doc said let's not treat his UTI and just let him go. I fought that, as I know a UTI can sometimes cause horrible pain. But when the pneumonia came, his daughters decided to let him go. Doc convinced them that CO2 narcosis caused him to not feel the SOB or pain. I wonder.

Granted, his life was only about being completely bedridden, incontinent, dependent, falling, getting tied down, wiggling free, crawling naked on the floor after falling OOB. Oh, it was a terrible scene. Terrible and repeated several times. It was decided to let the bacteria win. Mixed feelings about it on my part.

Why do you continue to work in this area if it is so hard for you? I know it is hard but I wonder if maybe it might be time for a change for you personally? Not trying to tell you what to do, just thinking aloud.

I was not aware of this. How disgusting! I think the government should just stay out of health care. It is murder to kill a baby when the parents dont want them taken off life support and Heaven help those who pull the plug, cause it sure as heck wont be me!

Sounds like you've been poisoned by right-wing radio entertainers who will say anything--facts/reason be damned--if it'll get your attention and increase ratings.

You are confusing me. You say, it is murder to take a baby off life support when the parents don't want them to be removed. Are you then saying it is not murder to take them off if the parents want them removed? You should be careful about throwing those words "kill" and "murder" around in these situations. Human beings are removed from life support everyday and no one is killing them, no one is murdering them. There is an issue here about removing a child from life support without the consent of both parents. It is a valid issue and needs to be discussed and it is no wonder it is ending up in court. A lot of times these things do end up in court for good reason. But using words like kill and murder turn the discussion into something altogether different. It is not murder to turn off machines and let a death that nature intended to take place. It is not killing someone to refuse treatment and allow nature to take it course.