[OneWingedShark]

You guys are full of it. My wife had a patient not more than a few years ago at most who was advised not by the obstetrical practice, but her cardiologist to not continue her pregnancy because of an existing heart condition. Patient ignored the advice and sure enough coded on the telemetry unit at 28 weeks. Her heart was just not strong enough to deal with the 150% blood volume associated with pregnancy. They still had fetal heart tones when an ECS was attempted, but that was futile as well. Both mother and baby were lost.

Maybe the patient couldn't stand the idea of abortion, thinking it to be murder. If that is the case then I cannot fault the decision to "ignore the advice" of the doctor.

[Melas]

Absolutely. I’m in no way judging the patient. My own wife took great risks with our youngest, after developing a DVT in her previous pregnancy and throwing an embulis (sp?) to her lung, almost dying. It was daily shots of low molecular weight heparin for months, and a few scary moments.

I’m suspecting that it is because of the high degree of emotion surrounding the subject matter, but there seems to be a complete inability for anyone to keep my posts in context today.

I relayed that incident solely to refute the nonsensical, untrue statement that, “The life of the mother or the baby NEVER (emphasis mine) happens in this day and age.” A statement which has nothing to do with the courage of the mother, so for the life of me, I cannot understand how my reply was taken as such either.