Hospital Harms Family

January 25, 2009 permalink

If you are a parent you may fear taking your child to a hospital for an injury because of the possibility of CAS intervention. Your fears are justified, as shown in this British story of a mother seeking help for a child with a tiny mark on his ear.

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Mother banned from being with baby over tiny mark on ear

Jan 24 2009 by Vicki Kellaway, Liverpool Echo

SOCIAL services banned a Liverpool woman from being alone with her baby for more than a fortnight after she took him to hospital about a tiny mark on his ear.

Lyndsey Craig told today of her ordeal after taking six-month-old Daniel to Alder Hey.

She said her baby had x-rays and a CT scan. Although there was no sign of injury, social workers banned his parents from looking after him for three weeks over Christmas and handed over responsibility to his grandparents who live 100 miles away.

Mrs Craig took Daniel to hospital because he had diarrhoea and sickness and she feared the mark was a symptom of meningitis.

But doctors described it as “unexplained” and referred the case to social services.

Mrs Craig, 24, was stopped from taking her son home until scans were complete and was banned from taking him outside for fresh air.

Daniel was discharged the following evening when his grandparents Florence and Jim signed a form promising to “support, supervise and monitor” his care.

They left their Lake District home and moved in with Lyndsey, her husband Tim, 30, and son Sam, four, in Broadgreen.

When the couple had to return home for a few days, Daniel spent three nights with his aunt in Walton.

The ban was lifted on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.

Mrs Craig, who works as a solicitors’ account assistant, said: “It was awful. They came to me in the hospital with a big form asking if my husband and I had been abused as children.

“I said I wanted to take him home and social services said if I did they would send the police around to arrest me and put my children into foster care.”

Mrs Craig took Daniel to the hospital at 9.30am on December 15.

He was discharged at 6pm the following day with his grandparents put in charge until a Child Protection Conference on January 8.

Source: Liverpool Echo