What happens when doctors disagree on a pediatric
diagnosis? What are the parents’ rights
in a diagnosis dispute? Do they have
any?
Many of my faithful readers will be familiar with the story
of Justina Pelletier. I have been following
the case of this 15 year old girl for several months. For new readers I will give a quick recap
here:
Justina is a 15 year old Connecticut girl, she had been
diagnosed with Mitochondrial Disease at Tuft’s Medical Center by Dr. Mark
Korson. In February of 2013 Justina
developed the flu, Dr. Korson suggested that the family take Justina to Boston
Children’s Hospital (BCH) to see her gastroenterologist who had recently moved
to BCH.
When the family arrived at BCH they were told they would not
be allowed to see the gastroenterologist, the staff at BCH quickly changed
Justina’s diagnosis from Mitochondrial Disease to Somatoform Disorder, a
psychological condition that manifests in physical symptoms. They stopped all of her medications and moved
her to the psychiatric ward of the hospital.
When the parents objected and said they were going to return their
daughter to her doctors at Tufts the hospital made allegations of medical child
abuse and the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families (DCF) took
temporary custody of Justina. The
parents have been fighting to regain custody ever since.
The theme of the many, many court dates has been
postponement, but a decision was finally made last week. Judge Johnston granted “permanent” custody to
DCF. This ruling cannot be reviewed by
the court for 6 months, the judge backdated the decision to December, so the
family’s next court date is May 25th, 2014.
In January, Justina was moved to a non-medical psychiatric
facility. The average stay at this
facility is 2 weeks or less, she has now been there over 2 months. Her family feels that this is a dangerous environment
for Justina. According to her father,
Lou Pelletier, before developing the flu last year his daughter was a typical
active teenager, she handled her chronic illness well and enjoyed activities
such as figure skating. By the time she
was moved to this non-medical facility in January 2014, she was confined to a
wheelchair barely able to walk.
The family’s position is that Boston Children’s Hospital and
Massachusetts DCF have kidnapped their daughter and are neglecting her medical
needs to a point that her life is in imminent danger.
Lou Pelletier has been on a media campaign to raise
awareness of his daughter's condition and situation. The family’s last big media appearance was on
the Dr. Phil show about two weeks ago. The
episode was well done and featured opinions from many experts on custody
battles. The overarching theme was that
any custody case involving the state should focus on creating a safe
environment at home so the child could return to the family. This is done through investigation of the
home and family life, counseling, education, etc. basically whatever is
necessary to reunite the child with his/her family. According to the Pelletier family no
investigation has been done and they do not feel that Massachusetts DCF has any
intention of working to return custody of their daughter.
The trouble with this story is that we only have the
Pelletier family’s side, DCF has remained extremely tight lipped, making very
few statements regarding the case, none that have been particularly informative
or helpful. From all appearances the
family is calm, together, medically literate, and rational. I recognize that their side of the story is certainly
biased and we must keep that in mind, however with the silence from DCF, lack
of criminal charges toward the parents, and drastic difference in this girl
through photos from this year and last, the family’s story appears to be credible.
A few weeks ago Judge Johnston ruled that Justina’s medical
care be transferred from Boston’s Children’s Hospital back to Tufts. This was considered a win for Justina’s
family, and the parent’s called to help facilitate Justina’s appointment with
Dr. Korson. Massachusetts DCF refused to
take Justina to Tufts prior to this most recent decision, it remains to be seen
what they will do now that they have been granted custody.
One of the things I fail to understand in this case is how
BCH could override the diagnosis from Tufts and because they make a new
diagnosis have grounds to remove this child from the custody of her
parents. What are a parent’s rights in
healthcare situations? Do they have the
right to decide: who treats their child, which doctors to trust, or whether to
seek a second opinion?
A key player in the new diagnosis of Somatoform Disorder was
Simona Bujoreanu PhD. Somatoform
Disorder takes a very long time to diagnose, before a diagnosis can be
confirmed, the physician must rule out any possible medical cause. Physicians at Boston Children’s Hospital
allegedly diagnosed Justina with Somatoform disorder in just 12 hours.
I think it is
important to focus on Dr. Bujoreanu because of an article she wrote a few years
ago. The article is titled: “Approach to
Psychosomatic Illness in Adolescents.”
Dr. Bujoreanu claims in this article that “20-50% of all patients
complaining of physical symptoms can be categorized as having medically
unexplained symptoms.” As the article
goes on she seems to claim that psychosomatic diagnoses are a catch-all for
these patients with symptoms that cannot be immediately medically
explained. She makes broad strokes about
what can be considered psychosomatic and does not focus on how time consuming a
diagnosis like this should be. She
talked about how families may react badly to a psychosomatic diagnosis, but did
not stress how careful a psychologist should be in making the diagnosis.
In Justina’s case her physical symptoms had been explained
by a diagnosis of Mitochondrial Disorder, the doctors at Boston Children’s
Hospital simply rejected this diagnosis.
I think doctors need to be extremely careful when countering the
diagnosis of another physician and if the new diagnosis is psychosomatic even
more time and evidence will be needed.
The decision of the judge this week was very disappointing. The family has been investigated by Connecticut
Department of Children and Families and nothing was found. Connecticut Department of Children and
Families has repeatedly turned down a transfer of Justina to their custody,
presumably because they have previously cleared this family. I also feel very strongly that before a child
is placed in “permanent” foster care against the express wishes of the family,
some sort of criminal charges should need to be filed against the parents. I am frankly appalled that something like
this could happen in America.
Parents should be allowed to disagree with a diagnosis and
to have their child treated by the medical professional of their choice. If the child is in danger of abuse or neglect
by a family member criminal charges should be filed along with the request for
custody by the hospital or state. I am a
very strong advocate for parental rights, and believe that excepting extreme
cases custody of and decisions for children should remain with the parents. Parents need to have defined rights in
medical situations, perhaps this case can motivate us to more plainly secure
parental rights when a child is ill. I
have said it before, but will stress it again, I am shocked and saddened that
removal of a child from her family like this does not have to be associated
with criminal charges against the parents.
I have so much to say about this case and I am sure I have
not typed my last on this story. I was
glad to hear that the family plans to continue the fight at the appellate court
level. I will be following this closely
as it develops, I hope you will as well.
More to come…