Nurse Drops Newborn And Fractures His Skull

Then the unthinkable happened. On February 20th, Bond received a call that her son was dropped by a nurse while being fed, and his skull was fractured.

“I received a phone call at eight o’clock in the morning saying that the nurse had fallen asleep feeding him and woke up to him crying on the floor,” the 19-year-old mother said

She spoke with the department manager who apologized. “She said she was sorry … and that a pediatrician had looked at him and said he was fine. My husband was losing his mind,” she added.

A hospital document t confirmed that one of the hospital’s registered nurses “was feeding baby on her lap, and she fell asleep.”

“Next thing she noted baby on floor, baby possibly slid down from her lap but mechanism of fall is unclear; Keiran cried, no documented loss of consciousness … Assessed by the pediatrician on call after the fall and no abnormalities were noted.”

If that was not bad enough, Bond says it was hours before she was notified.

“They didn’t call me for five hours,” he said. “You’re supposed to be notified right away.”

Bond was at home caring for Kayden and her 2-year-old son Keegan when the hospital called. While trying to arrange transportation to the hospital as she was caring for her other two sons, The Intelligencer reported that she asked the hospital to perform an ultrasound on her son. She later arrived at the hospital with her mother in-law.

“It did look like his head was a little bit swollen and red on the left-hand side,” Bond said , even though a second pediatrician had told her that he was fine.

“I had a gut feeling that everything wasn’t OK,” said Bond.

Bond asked for her son to be transferred to another hospital, where a subsequent ultrasound and CT scan revealed “a depressed fracture in Keiran’s skull and an acute subdural hematoma – the collection of blood between the brain and skull.”

Hospital spokesperson Carol Smith Romeril spoke to the National Post, but she wouldn’t directly comment on the nurse on duty that night. She did however offer up her apologies about the entire incident.

“This is a very experienced, highly-qualified, great nurse,” she said. “The nurse reported this incident immediately … under the normal procedures,” she confirmed.

She went on to say that nurses are people too, and sadly, sometimes accidents happen. “The staff are just excellent and provide really compassionate and professional care. Our staff are also human and so when things like this happen we are really sorry. We certainly recognize and apologize for the anxiety and the stress this has added to the family despite the fact they’ve been through so much already,” Smith Romeril said.

“We have provided direct apologies.”

Bond said that the nurse in question is still working, although Smith Romeril wouldn’t comment.

“If she was tired she shouldn’t have gone to work,” she said. “She’s risking children’s lives, and these aren’t just normal, full-term babies. They need special care.”

Bond also confirmed that she plans to sue the hospital.