Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
Jan
1
Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
“Well This Is A Fine Mess…”
“Well this is a fine mess you have got yourself into, maybe you will think twice before deciding to refuse medical care for a pregnancy.” – OB nurse to mother who had waited three weeks after her early pregnancy was determined to be non-viable by her home birth midwife, to see if she could miscarry naturally, before scheduling a D&C.
There are 22 comments to this post.
this is just sad. The insensitivity of that ob is completely out of line. I had a missed misscarriage that went undiagnosed for 4 weeks and i was FINE. Nature sometimes takes a little while and the emotional journey she must have been on while carrying her non viable baby for 3 weeks (knowingly) deserved compassion and understanding. What an ass.
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“now this is a fine mess” –> so the OB had never witnessed a miscarriage before?
“you’ve gotten yourself into” –> so the mom caused her own miscarriage? Really?
“maybe you will think twice” –> implying that the mom made the decision without thinking? That she didn’t consider the risk/benefit balance of miscarrying naturally?
” before deciding to refuse medical care for a pregnancy” –> So the doctor was not, in fact, providing medical care? Or was he implying that if she had come to him, the baby would not have miscarried?
I’m completely befuddled by this doctor’s entire sentence. Since it makes no sense, none of it!, then his blame-the-mother attitude is simply punitive. He (or she) is simply offended that this mom opted for midwifery care instead of obstetric care.
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I’m curious to find out if there is any sensitivity training at all involved in becoming an OB nurse…
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Lovely Labor RN Reply:
January 2nd, 2010 at 6:38 am (Quote)
Christi…. are you SERIOUS?? THAT comment feels like a slap in the face. It is too bad that this poor mom had to have a Nurse that was certainly NOT compassionate or empathetic, but please don’t generalize….. and yes sensitivity is a skill that can be learned and some nursing courses actually DO try to teach those skills, unfortunately some people are harder to “train” than others.
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Kat Reply:
January 2nd, 2010 at 7:35 am (Quote)
How is being curious about the training involved in becoming a nurse a slap in the face?
It’s a valid question: Is there any formal training in a nursing program that addresses compassionate and sensitive behavior towards patients who are suffering a painful loss?
If there is, how can it be improved to reduce incidents like this?
If there is not, well, it’s high time don’t you think?
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L&Dnurse Reply:
January 3rd, 2010 at 11:02 pm (Quote)
Yes, as a matter of fact there is EXTENSIVE training in most nursing programs about sensitive and compassionate care. Many L&D units also make this a very important part of training. We don’t just care for women with normal healthy babies, after all. We also care for women whose babies have fatal anomalies, or who die in utero, or who are born too early or too sick and die after birth. We care for women who have heartbreaks and losses you probably can’t even imagine.
It is indeed a slap in the face to ASSume that nurses have no such training, or that we need it in order to behave with basic human decency when faced with a patient who has suffered a heartbreaking loss. How dare you ASSume that because some L&D nurses sometimes say things or do things you disagree with or disapprove of, we must all be evil monsters devoid of human compassion and decency.
Oh, and by the way, this specific story doesn’t even involve a nurse. That doesn’t make the doctor’s behavior okay (and it does not excuse the piss-poor behavior of nurses whose comments have been included on the site before), but don’t blame nurses when this isn’t even a comment that involves a nurse in any way! It’s not the nurse’s fault when the doctor is an ass. Put the blame on the right person, not on someone who wasn’t even involved.
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L&Dnurse Reply:
January 3rd, 2010 at 11:07 pm (Quote)
I apologize, I’m wrong. I could have sworn it said OB, not OB nurse. I even read it again when I saw your comment. So this nurse is a complete jerk. My mistake, I apologize.
But I still stand by my comment that it’s a slap in the face to ASSume that all of us are awful, just because some are insensitive.
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Alice Reply:
January 4th, 2010 at 6:29 am (Quote)
There was no such assumption made. They just asked a question.
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Kat Reply:
January 4th, 2010 at 8:07 am (Quote)
Please quote the section where anyone said all OB nurses are insensitive or incompetent, etc.
All I saw was one simple question about what level of sensitivity training (if any) is typical for the training of a nurse. How does that question assume all nurses are insensitive or whatever? And OBVIOUSLY some nurses do need it, or this sort of thing wouldn’t happen, so to assume none of the nurses need it, and not require any training in sensitivity would only increase incidents like this.
I have had various experiences with nurses, some fabulous, some where I was lied to, insulted, and treated poorly. I certainly don’t assume all nurses are lying, arrogant and rude. But I can’t just walk into a hospital and assume I will be treated with dignity and respect either, because experience shows it’s about a 50/50 chance where I live.
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Jane Reply:
January 4th, 2010 at 8:23 am (Quote)
At the hospital I used, it was two out of three L&D nurses were awesome and caring, and that last one out of three was just plain mean, awful and/or incompetent.
A friend of mine was told by a GYN ward nurse that L&D at her own hospital had a reputation for the nastiest nurses,and that even with her working as a nurse at that same hospital, when she gave birth, they treated her like hell.
It honestly depends on the hospital, but some of the things done to me or my friends in the name of “care” are just shocking.
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honestly i find this just as offensive as the docs taking care of my sister several years ago when the baby died at about 5 months. they then made her wait several weeks to do anything and topped it off with making her birth the baby natural because it was already dead. they said the epiderals (she has a very low pain threshold and very emotional rollercoaster type person) are useless for that kind of situation.
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This is mine. I actually found out at 10 weeks the pregnancy was non-viable. Then I waited 3 more weeks for it to end. After the three weeks, I called my OB in desperation, but they wouldn’t give me an appointment because I had decided to go with a midwife and they knew nothing of my pregnancy (delivered my son a year before). My midwife also stopped taking my calls at this time, so thankfully, I went to a local herb store and found the right doses of cohosh that ended the pregnancy…I finally miscarried in my home, alone, at 14 weeks, 7 weeks after the baby had died. I am now 28 weeks pregnant and under the care of a new midwife whom I love and plan on giving birth to this child at home.
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Lauren Reply:
January 1st, 2010 at 9:17 pm (Quote)
Oh Alyssa, I’m so sorry this happened to you! It tugs at my heart because I refused medical interventions for a m/c last year. The dr was a fearmongering ass, and tried to get me to take Cytotec (!!!!!) or do a D&C, telling me horror stories the whole time. I told him I was fine to miscarry naturally at the time, and I was. I got pregnant again 3 months later and just had my lovely daughter this past October. 
Praying your birth is wonderful!!
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Oh, Alyssa, that is terrible beyond comprehension. I’m so sorry you had to go through that. What irresponsible jerks to treat you that way, including the midwife that ignored you. I am glad to hear you are doing well and expecting another baby. I also saw only a homebirth midwife with my first pregnancy, which, like yours, was a missed miscarriage that I carried for weeks, but unfortunately I had no choice about seeing an OB because I hemorrhaged and needed an emergency D&C so I wouldn’t bleed to death. I could share some real gems from the military hospital staff about how I was treated during that whole ordeal, but I don’t think most of them knew/understood that I was planning a homebirth to use that as ammo against me. They were just plain insensitive to how devastated I was that I’d lost my baby. I don’t think there’s enough sensitivity training in the world to help some of the doctors I saw. And dealing with the military insurance was a nightmare too.
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First off, I’d like to say that I can’t believe some of the comments that come from medical professionals. However, there are very real risks if you don’t spontaneously end the miscarried pregnancy and you do need to be watched closely. And most women do not want to wait for nature to take it’s course, which is probably why the OBs seem to push cytotec or a D&C. Regarding the 5 month loss, most of the docs where I work offer moms the option of immediate induction or wait and see. Many choose immediate induction. And yes, you can have an epidural, and yes, it does work just as well as if it were for a live birth.
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heidi Reply:
January 2nd, 2010 at 3:03 pm (Quote)
the 5 month loss was my sis, she was a wife of a soldier so was at a military doc. i’ve found that more of them have less compassion than most the ones i’ve come across elsewhere. i’m sure there are some fantastic military docs, just that the people i have known in the military dont seem to get to see them…
but the doc and nurses that induced her for the stillbirth told her it couldn’t be done, i figured it was just them not wanting to but she really is a patsy and just takes anything that they said as gospel, so she birthed natural because that’s what they told her had to be done.
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Sheila Reply:
January 2nd, 2010 at 5:56 pm (Quote)
Heidi, I have heard (but have no experience with) military hospitals not giving the best care. But I’ve also heard that they give great care. So maybe it’s more the people than the facility. Regardless, you certainly can get epidurals for laboring and delivering a stillborn baby; in fact at my hospital you’re very likely to get the epidural immediately, before induction is started!
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i must have missed something, it says she was being taken care of by a midwife, how does that constitute refusing care for a pregnancy? that just seems really duh of that nurse…
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Meg Reply:
January 2nd, 2010 at 5:27 am Meg(Quote)
And besides, isn’t the right to refuse treatment a fundamental adult human right, that goes along with personal autonomy? When did this idea get lost?
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