Michael Clifford: Delayed justice for baby Christopher shows a dark side of the business of law
Rebecca Price outside the Four Courts after the settlement of a High Court action for damages. Picture: Collins Courts
An ordeal that began in March 2019 with devastating news for an expectant couple finally came to an end in the High Court yesterday.
Rebecca Price and Pat Kiely had brought an action for damages over the wrongful termination of their unborn son.
The procedure took place in the National Maternity Hospital (NMH) in Dublin’s Holles Street after the couple was told that a fatal foetal abnormality was present and there was no hope of survival.
Two weeks after the termination, the final results of tests showed, contrary to what they had been assured, that the baby had no such abnormality.
The hearing into the case was due to begin on Tuesday but after a day of negotiations the defendants, which included the NMH, the clinic where the initial scans were taken, and the laboratory that processed the results, all conceded liability.
That it took over two years to get to that point, and that it only occurred on the day that the issue was to get a public airing, is not unusual in medical negligence cases but, nonetheless, is a dark side of the law business.
Yesterday was another day of negotiations, this time over the terms of the settlement.
At 4.20pm, agreement was reached. As part of the settlement, the defendants will confirm in writing to Health Minister Stephen Donnelly that the DNA extracted from the foetus, named by the couple as Christopher Joseph Kiely, showed "no evidence of chromosome 18 abnormality and specifically no evidence of mosaicism of Trisomy 18" — the rare chromosomal condition affecting how long a baby may survive, with most babies dying before or shortly after birth.
Afterwards, a statement from the couple laid out their priorities. They want an urgent meeting with the minister for health to “work with him on ways to ensure this 'never event' never happens again".
It has been reported that, in an earlier attempt at mediation, it was laid out that one of the main issues they wanted to be addressed was how exactly assurances could be given that no other couple would have to go through what had been thrust on them.
They have already met the minister for health and his predecessor Simon Harris in pursuit of some resolution but now that the legal case is dealt with there is no reason why Mr Donnelly wouldn’t respond in a fulsome manner.
At no point over the two days in the Four Courts did anybody in authority in the NMH show up. The master, as the effective chief executive is known, was not present, neither was the consultant obstetrician who oversaw care of Rebecca Price. Neither was any of the other three consultants who share ownership of the private clinic where the ordeal all began.
For Rebecca Price and Pat Kiely, the ending of the legal action and some resolution with the hospital and clinic means that they can attempt to bring closure to this phase of their ordeal.
They will, as their pleadings in the action noted, have to live with the catastrophic event for the rest of their lives, but after two years and three months they can at least attempt to look forward now that the legal aspects are behind them.
