Child life support bill to be introduced

[cal04]

A bill prohibiting hospitals from automatically taking brain dead children off of respirators will be introduced in the state's legislature, a Bronx Supreme Court Justice said Saturday, at the funeral for the boy he ordered to be placed on life-support.Judge Douglas McKeon, who was accompanied by Assemblywoman Naomi Rivera (D-Bronx), told approximately 200 mourners at the service for Teron Francis, 13, at St. Augustine Church in Morrisania, that the legislation would protect the rights of other families in similar situations. "She asked me for a miracle," said Judge McKeon. "Not necessarily the miracle we prayed for; but a greater miracle."

The bill, which is being drafted by Judge McKeon, will be introduced by Assemblywoman Rivera, in the New York State Assembly. Under the bill, hospitals will not be able to remove a brain dead child off of a respirator without the input of an independent physician who must review the patient's condition before a decision is made. Teron was admitted to Bronx-Lebanon Hospital Center on April 18, after complaining of a severe headache and toothache.

He was later transferred to Children's Hospital of Montefiore Medical Center, where he slipped into a coma and was declared dead on April 21. Teron's family said the hospital tried to remove him from his life support machine -- a charge the hospital has denied.On April 22, Judge McKeon ordered Montefiore to keep the teen on life support.

Last Friday, when the boy's mother, Marcerlyn Francis, gave permission to remove Teron's respirator after an independent physician agreed with the hospital's findings. Afterwards the judge lifted the order and Teron was disconnected from the machine. "We are looking for a way to change the public health law," Mckeon said.

http://www.nynewsday.com/news/local/bronx/nyc-bill0508,0,511613.story?coll=nyc-homepage-breakingheadlines

[beyurslf]

1. At least NY is moving in the right direction..... away from TX which allow

hospitals to remove life support even over the wishes of parents.

[Warpy]

2. Sometimes the parents are stuck in a combination of false hope

and medical ignorance. When advised that they're prolonging death and causing unnecessary pain, they simply refuse to believe it. The Schindlers were not alone in that. As long as the machinery is connected and the chest rises and falls, they think their child is truly alive, when nothing could be farther from the truth.

Little kids are much harder to deal with, heartbreaking for staff as well as families. However, when continued life support is futile and the family has had plenty of time to come to terms with it and hasn't, there really needs to be a mechanism to do what is best for the child, and often that's turning the machinery off. Remember, I'm talking about brain dead patients or patients so severely ill that there is no hope for recovery.

The main problem with the Texas law is that it was restricted to the poor, meaning Grannies will still be tortured in ICUs when families can't let go because Medicare will pick up the tab. I think the Texas law will eventually be overturned for just that reason since it violates equal protection. I sincerely hope it is eventually rewritten to provide a process by which ethics committees (which contain clergy but not accountants) can try to help families recognize the hopelessness of the situation if they can and overrule them if they can't.