A colleague of Dr Vaishnavy Laxman has described the moment the doctor asked the mother of the baby to give a good push during the botched surgery that saw the baby’s head being decapitated inside the mother’s womb.
Doctors at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee told a tribunal that they believed they were preparing for a c-section when Laxman asked the mother, who was only about 3 cm dialted, to give a good push.
“Dr Laxman was encouraging the patient to push and she was pulling the baby down – this was not what I was expecting,” Dr Shmaila Siddiki said at the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service.
“I was speaking to another doctor who said ‘how is she going to do it – how is she going to deliver the head’. I was so shocked at what was happening. I just said ‘it’s dead, this baby is going to die’. I was so shocked,” said Siddiki.
The incident happened in March 2014.
“If she was fully dilated, the baby could be delivered vaginally but she never communicated with the patient about doing a vaginal delivery,” added Siddiki. “I never got the information that she was going to do that. I’m not sure what she was doing.”
Dr Laxman reportedly pulled the baby’s legs and had managed to deliver the baby till the chest before the infant’s head was decapitated. Two other doctors had to perform a c-section to remove the head and reattach it to the infant’s body so that his mother could hold the child.
Dr Laxman has denied contributing to the baby’s death.
Speaking to the mother, known only as Patient A, Dr Laxman’s lawyer Gerard Boyle QC said: “Dr Laxman has asked me to say she is so very sorry and deeply saddened for the outcome of your baby.”
The hearing continues.
