Girl starves to death after dentist pulls teeth
By Jill Lawless, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2009/02/10/8335551-ap.html


LONDON - Eight-year-old Sophie Waller cracked a baby tooth eating candy, and set off the chain of events that led to her death.

Sophie refused to open her mouth for a dentist so doctors at her local hospital took out the tooth in an operation, one of the doctors told a coroner's inquest. They removed all seven of her other baby teeth at the same time to avoid the need for future operations, the doctor said.

After the surgery Sophie refused to eat or even open her mouth for her parents, the couple told the inquest. But she was sent home anyway, and starved to death three weeks after the operation.

The parents said the hospital mishandled Sophie's follow-up care, referring them to a child psychologist who told them not to worry about Sophie's plummeting weight. Sophie's mother, Janet Waller, said she also was told to consult her family doctor, who prescribed nutrition drinks over the phone but did not see the girl in person.

Pediatric pathologist Dr. Marie-Ann Brundler said Sophie died at home Dec. 2, 2005 from kidney failure caused by starvation and dehydration. The inquest was told Sophie weighed 72 pounds when she went into hospital and lost a third of that weight before she died.

An official at the Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro, 400 kilometres southwest of London, said there had been failures in Sophie's care, and it had changed its procedures.

"The impact of Sophie's death has been a wide-ranging impact across all of the disciplines that were involved," John Ellis, a pediatrician at the hospital, told the inquest. "There have been changes."

The hospital said it would not comment further until the end of the inquest, which was continuing Tuesday to establish the facts behind the girl's death.

Janet Waller told the inquest in Truro that Sophie had developed a fear of dentists after her tongue was nipped during a checkup, and had refused to let a dentist look at her loose tooth.

"Because Sophie would not open her mouth for examination, I wanted to eliminate any further dental problems," Tamsin Hearle, a specialist in pediatric dentistry, was quoted as saying by the Times newspaper.

Hearle said the parents signed a consent form for the procedure. The Wallers said they thought they were consenting to one tooth being removed. Waller told the inquest that Sophie was "devastated" when she found out the eight teeth had been removed.

She said that doctors did not adequately take care of Sophie after the girl was sent home from hospital Nov. 17, 2005, eight days after the operation.

"No one saw her after she was discharged from hospital," Waller, 34, told the inquest Monday. "I told (a child psychologist) she was sucking on a watermelon, she told me that was enough for her to survive on."

Janet Waller said she and her husband phoned the hospital to express concern about Sophie's weight loss and refusal to eat, and were told not to bring her in, but to talk to the community child psychologist assigned to the case.

Sophie's father, Richard Waller, said he phoned the psychologist "every day, sometimes twice a day, to say how unwell she looked."

"I kept asking her to come round but she said she would next week and there was nothing to worry about," he said.

Ellis, the pediatrician, said Sophie had stopped eating when she had loose teeth in the past, and "it was clear there were psychological issues" around her refusal to eat.

A coroner's inquest is required in Britain to establish the facts when someone dies unexpectedly, violently or of unknown causes, but has no power to punish anyone. The coroner is expected to rule next week.

The Wallers have criticized the time it has taken to hold the inquest. The coroner's office said it was a complex case and it took time to gather reports and inquiries from the different agencies involved.

not good.

What is not to love about Britain's universal health care system?

What were the parents thinking?

If it was my daughter I would be doing a lot more than phoning the psychologist. I would be raising hell about it if the doctors were continually brushing it off for three weeks.

I just don't understand how this could go on.

How the fuck is a parent stupid enough to let their child starve to death in front of their eyes and not take her to the hospital. These people must be absolutely fucking retarded.

Seriously. Blame the health care practitioners my ass.

Parent: Hey, this is Assface again, my daughter is still losing weight and I think she is starving to death.
Psych: Don't worry about it, she is fine.
Parent: Ok, that's good to hear. Talk to you tomorrow.

Physicians that do their job tend to actually see their patients before they die. The hospital, and the greater broken system of the UK, dropped the ball here as per usual.

The health care system is certainly messed up. Perhaps it is cynical, but it really doesn't surprise me that the system doesn't care.

What disturbs me is the parents not properly looking after their flesh & blood.

The parents are most certainly to blame as well.

In cases like that, isnt the thing to do is sedate the girl and inject stuff in the veins?

Just give her back her fucking teeth, man.

What I find incredible is how she managed to have the will to starve. I mean, Im sure i would start to eat earth after 5 days without any food.

wow, so they let it get to the point of her death without going to the hospital and tube feeding her? That's quite odd, and the psycologist should have his license revoked. No shit the girl had psycological problems.

Do they not have feeding tubes in Britian?

Nope not in Truro.

They have gold plated ones in London but in Truro you are fucked.

that about sums it up

i was thinking this too

but, wow.

there's definitely plenty of blame to go around here...

This is all on the parents. They're the retards who let their kid starve to death.

Perhaps your parents should be questioned before something happens to you.

he's 18