Late last night I saw a link on Face Book about a Christmas miracle in Colorado. A woman was in labor and all of a sudden without warning had cardiac arrest and died. Her lifeless baby was delivered via a cesarean section and in perfect Christmas miracle fashion the mother and infant were revived and lived to talk about it.
The story is all over the media. “She inexplicably went into cardiac arrest” and like a perfect Christmas miracle both mother and infant came back to life. According to many articles she was given an emergency cesarean section right in her labor room with “no anesthesia.”
Now before we look at the TRUTH of what happened, please know I am GRATEFUL that she and her infant were able to receive life saving treatment. God bless her and her family.
Unfortunately the story the media is giving is covering up the facts of what really happened and I am infuriated that the entire story is not being told. In eliminating the TRUTH of what happened we are preventing women from getting honest information about “routine” hospital procedures that carry multiple risks. This is NOT fair!!
Understanding that I don’t have EVERY fact of the case… the deal is this… her water bag broke on its own. When she arrived at the hospital they decided to give her Pitocin to speed up labor. The contractions became difficult for her to handle and while she did NOT have an epidural with her first or second birth she decided she would get an epidural this time. AFTER the epidural was placed, she went into cardiac arrest.
Watch the video interview on GMA as Tracy, the Miracle mom herself, tells you the true story.
This is a risk of getting an epidural and its unfortunate that the media is saying NOTHING about the possible link between her epidural and her “unexplained cardiac arrest.” Does it happen often? No. Is it possible? Yes, just ask the Miracle mom and baby.
Addendum: Because I was personally NOT present during the case mentioned there is no way for me to say for SURE that the epidural in fact CAUSED this woman’s cardiac arrest. (As pointed out by one of my readers.) She is right we can’t automatically say one thing caused the other without full investigation. I just want it to be clear that Epidurals can indeed cause cardiac problems and can also stop a woman’s breathing immediately after administration. Does it always happen. NO. Does it usually happen NO. Can it happen. YES. And did the media completly ignore the possiblity of the epidural having anything to do with the cardiac arrest YES.
In fact just a couple of months ago a similar situation happened in a hospital where I was working. The outcome was a little different because the anesthesiologist was still in the room. He immediately intubated the patient and they went straight to the OR for an emergency cesarean section.
Often when I tell people I don’t want an epidural they don’t understand why. THIS is why. The risk in my humble opinion are high for a procedure that is considered elective.
Often when I tell people epidurals carry risks that are not discussed with women resulting in Mis-informed consent for a procedure they know little about, I am considered an extremist. PLEASE if you want an epidural, that’s your choice but get INFORMED!!!
ADDENDUM #2: While commenting on Reality Rounds discussion of this same situation a few points accored to me that I wanted to bring to the discussion…
I SPECULATE that there are four things that could have happened…. She got TOO MUCH medicine, the medicine went into the WRONG SPOT, she got the WRONG MEDICINE, or she had an ALLERGIC REACTION.
Also…. When she mentioned a catheter being placed, I initially did think about the epidural cath but then realized she also said she was laying down which then made me think it was a urinary catheter. If she was flat on her back immediately after her epidural placement that could have caused her to have a servere HYPOtensive episode resulting cardiac arrest. Hypotension does happen with many epidural placements so perhaps she was getting hypotensive and laying her down made took it to the bottom! I always do BPs during epidural placement but through my travels have worked in facilities where they don’t monitor the BP so closely. *smh* Who knows.
And one last thing… can the media tell the truth for once. The real truth, The whole truth. GEESH!! I guess that’s why we have blogs, twitter, and the like so we can share the truth. Okay enough yelling for one day 
Peace and Blessings Yall!!!
In Birth and Love
Nicole
Just curious – are we SURE (i.e. are the docs giving the entire truth? Haha, as if.) that Cytotec was not involved in this episode? And 20% of AFE is survivable.
There are PILES of cases where Cytotec is given and given and then topped off with Pit, which would not make their statement about Pit a lie – it just wouldn’t be the whole truth.
I wish I was an investigative journalist. Or her neighbor…
LOL… @ “I wish I was an investigative journalist. Or her neighbor” LOL…. me too!! I wish I knew someone who worked at the hospital that I could bribe for details!! I doubt if Cytotec was used however… AFE (Amniotic Fluid Embolism) can certainly be caused by Pitocin induction especially with a broken bag of waters.
Her clinical picture does not sound like an AFE although the thought popped into my mind as well. She described feeling tired and sounded like she was calm through the experience. She just layed back to go to sleep. With AFE there will usually be severe shortness of breath. The incident happened in a nanosecond. Where with AFE things progress from SOB, to hypotention, to possibly seizures and then into cardiac arrest. And with AFE survivors they are pretty sick aftewards. She was totally fine. So I dont think it was an AFE but like I said the thought definitely popped into my mind as a differential diagnoses prior to getting more details.
Reality Rounds has a good discussion about this case here –> http://realityrounds.com/2009/12/29/crash-c-section-on-dead-mom-with-miraculous-result/#comments
She also suspects the epidural was either placed high or anesthesia was accidentally placed into a vein. Of course this is all speculation.
Yep that’s what I suspect as well. Or she had an allergic reaction to the meds. Basically I see four different possibilites (all speculations of course) she got too much med, the med went in the wrong space, she got the wrong med, or she was allergic to the med. Thanks for the link I will check it out.
Epidurals can and DO cause cardiac problems. My unit recently received a transfer from a smaller hospital of a woman who went into SVT while getting an epidural. Her HR was in the 220s. The anesthesiologists pulled everything out of her back and transferred her via. ambulance to us (a larger, more well-equipped hospital with a cath-lab, etc). Luckily he labor continued to progress and when she hit transition she vomited and cardioverted back to sinus tachycardia with a HR of about 110. All follow-up (echo, etc…) was normal and she went home with a healthy baby… I don’t think I’ve EVER heard an anesthesiologist (even the good ones) mention the risk of cardiac problems when getting consent.
WOW!! Interesting story. YAY! for a little transition to complete emesis! I have certainly NEVER heard an anesthesiologist mention cardiac risks. I remember at this one hospital they would always say. “There are a few risk, the most common is a headache but I will know if you are going to get a headache before the end of the procedure. Any questions?” And the papers were signed and away things went!
In listening to the mother’s story, and the physicians, it occurs to me that it’s also possible that this mum has either an undiagnosed cardiac defect, possibly Long QT syndrome ( often undiagnosed and asymptomatic ) that might have caused a vasovagal syncope? I’m not wanting to sound too critical of your assessment but given that there are other potential issues here, including a preterm birth ( 7 weeks ) and perhaps underlying complications that caused the prematurity, such that leaping to the conclusion that the placement of the epidural caused the arrest seems equally premature. There are multiple possibilities here and many that are more likely to have caused the problem than the epidural ( and yes, I know that cardiac arrest is a potential side effect of regional anesthesia but, again, that doesn’t make it even the likliest culprit in this case ). Anyway…it’s an interesting story and worth following up on. Perhaps someone will report something with more detail as a follow up and we’ll know more for sure.
Michelle,
We may have to agree to disagree on the epidural piece but that is okay with me. As far as her being 7 weeks early I found that really interesting because her infant weighed over 7 pounds (unless I mis-heard) I wonder what her true gestational age is/was. You are right, an interesting story and I would also like to get the full story if/when its ever available.
I watched the GMA interview, and noticed that at one point the mom mouths, “7 weeks?!” like she just heard that was supposedly how early the baby was born. Given the other facts of the case (the baby’s weight, that they didn’t try to stop her labor but were speeding it up, and that the baby was discharged very quickly and not kept in the NICU for a week or more as he dealt with prematurity issues), I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that the baby was actually full term, and the reports of preterm birth are false.
But even if the mom had some underlying factor, that doesn’t mean that the Pit or epidural didn’t aggravate that condition and ultimately cause (“the straw that broke the camel’s back”?) the heart attack. And if so, then this information needs to be even more strongly stated, so that other moms can either be tested to make sure they do not have a similar condition, or if they know they have the same thing that they can avoid a potentially deadly reaction — if it was something like that, as opposed to a complete fluke or a rare allergic reaction or something like that.
Hi Kathy
Earlier someone tweeted about how she felt sorry for the family now having to go through all those interview etc. Initially I didn’t, but now I do because if the bigger story is shared its going to be more drama for them and that’s unfortunate.
You are dead on with the supposed prematurity issue. I was like No Way!
I certainly think the epidural was a factor, regardless of the possiblity of an underlying factor. Its all a bit fishy/strange/interesting. What ever spin you wanna put on it
Proximity of events is NOT causal! I don’t disagree with you that there are pernicious and undisclosed side effects from epidurals ( or any of the other routine OB drugs/procedures ) but the fact that one event happened before another event ( the epidural is placed and then mom has cardiac arrest ) does not mean that the epidural CAUSED the cardiac arrest and we have to be very, very careful about the way we generate our own “facts” and “truth” in these situations. I too, am a Midwife and I don’t like what happens in the hospital to most of our mothers but I also know that we have to be just as scrupulous and honest in what we put out as “information”. Until someone can prove cause and effect, all we have here is correlation!
Hi Michelle, you are RIGHT, proximity of events does not apply causation. I added a short addendum to my post
I just found this post from Feminist Breeder’s twitter post! OMG that is shocking and crazy. Ironically, last night I went on a tour of our hospitals labor and delivery ward. I am lucky in that they have a natural birth clinic in the hospital that is intervention free and that is where I intend to give birth…but I wanted to tour the rest of the hospital in case I ended up high risk and could not go to the birthing center. Anyways – while in the labor room one of the husbands of another woman asked if “all the stories about problems with epidural’s were true?” The nurse giving the tour explained that no intervention is without risk but didn’t really go into detail as to what those risks were. So I spoke up and asked what the risks were and if there was a place to read about those risks before labor. Her response was that the anesthesiologist would explain that when the time came. I calmly said to her “look if I’m in the middle of labor and in enough pain to request an epidural I sincerely doubt that I will be in a good place to make an educated decision.” So finally the nurse said you could ask your doctor for resources or call the hospital and ask to speak to one of the anesthesiologist’s to talk to them. My hope was and is that knowing this will empower the husband that originally asked the question to follow up and learn about the risks associated with it. I don’t care if they use an epidural or not I just want them to make an educated decision prior to labor and delivery! Sorry that was a long comment but your post made me think about the couple from last night!
Not long at all Jenny and thanks for posting. I think that was great of you to ask the pointed questions that helped everyone on the tour. And you are absolutely right. Usually in the throws of labor women are definitely not in a good place to make an educated decision. A few of the hospitals I have worked at recently require parents view an epidural video put together by the anesthesia either during the prenatal period or right upon admisson. I think this is a good requirement. I have not watched one of the videos so I don’t know what types of risks are discussed but I do think being able to get the informtion prenatally is the best way.