UK - Nurse Lucy Letby, murder of babies, 7 Guilty of murder verdicts; 8 Guilty of attempted murder; 2 Not Guilty of attempted; 5 hung re attempted #36

[magikarpmagikarp]

The original Lee paper discussed air in the vessels originating from damage to the lungs. These cases occurred during a period of time before artificial lung surfactant was available, which meant that preemie lungs were very stiff and stuck closed. In order to move enough air for the baby to have hope of living, very high pressures were used and as a side effect this caused damage to the lungs, including the kind of damage that allowed air pushed into the lungs to be pushed into the blood from the capillaries in the lungs.

This sort of damage is unheard of now and would have been for decades. Certainly no baby at Chester would or should have experienced anything like it, full stop. Certainly no baby at Chester could be said to have had a collapse caused by precisely the same mechanism as described in the paper. (And a baby in the condition described by the paper who did have a collapse would have been completely expected. Those kids were truly on the verge of death at every moment. Absolutely the opposite of the babies at Chester. )

I don't know how much of this would have been discussed at trial because it is not relevant to the case. But I believe that any of the neonatal or pediatric doctors involved in the case and in the trial would have been aware of this history of lung destructive ventilation, and the older doctors might even have had personal experience with it. So they would have had a shared understanding of the context of the paper.

JMO

 

[magikarpmagikarp]

The Lee paper was a catalyst. It did not form the basis of the evidence or the investigation. MOO

 

[mrC]

so basically less paper is being used to say shes is guilty but when lee himself says shes is innocent he apparently doesn't know what hes talking about

 

[iamshadow21]

so basically less paper is being used to say shes is guilty but when lee himself says shes is innocent he apparently doesn't know what hes talking about

You seem to have the impression that only this one singular thing convicted Letby, when it was a totality of evidence presented over ten months of trial.

I'm confused that the rest of what was presented, at great length, doesn't seem to factor. It was an incredibly complex case with a lot of moving parts. It wasn't just one thing, but all the things in combination.

MOO

 

[mrC]

only the jury knows what convicted her

but if lees medical option is not to be trusted then nor is his paper you cant hae it both ways

 

[magikarpmagikarp]

https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/R-v-Letby-Final-Judgment-20240702.pdf

Go to point 15. Lee may be an expert on his own paper without being an expert on the totality of evidence which convicted Letby. This has already been presented to the court of appeals and answered.

 

[magikarpmagikarp]

MrC at times I am sorry to say that I think you are participating in this thread in bad faith.

 

[Tortoise]

This is interesting. I just reviewed Professor Sally Kinsey's evidence in the trial. It seems to negate Dr Lee's claims of what was presented at trial, in the context of his paper being about arterial embolism. IMO


Prof Kinsey is a retired Consultant Paediatric Haematologist ...

Prof Kinsey is now talking the jury through various diagrams which show how the body's air/blood circulation system works ...

Professor Kinsey is explaining, via diagrams, how the blood is pumped through the heart. ...

Mr Johnson asks if air is injected into the system via a syringe, what would happen.
Prof Kinsey explains the heart would be pumping, and the air bubbles would be broken into larger and tiny bubbles. The lungs would be able to cope with the smaller air bubbles, but the lungs would struggle with the larger air bubbles.
In babies, air bubbles would be going in the arterial circulation - blood returning to the heart passing straight out again without being oxygenated through the lungs.
This would lead to the changes in skin colour - a 'fluctuating' colour pattern, and would, the court hears, lead to the types of skin discolourations as described by doctors and nurses so far in the trial. ...

In babies, there is a section of the heart, called the oval foramen, which would still be open, meaning the air bubbles would go to the arterial circulation.
The air bubbles would be absorbed by the haemoglobin, causing skin discolourations which move around the body and a mixture of blue, pink and purple discolouration, Mr Johnson summarises. Professor Kinsey agrees.
...
Mr Myers asks if that can be applied to babies - if an air embolus could always lead to skin discolouration observations. Prof Kinsey said it would not.

Recap: Lucy Letby trial, Tuesday, November 29

 

[magikarpmagikarp]

As always, thank you for providing the receipts, Tortoise.

 

[Ruthbullock]

Baby four​

The baby girl was alleged to have died from the same cause as baby one, namely an injection of air into an intravenous line, leading to an air embolism that resulted in collapse, patchy discoloration of the skin and death.

The panel concluded that baby four had died from systemic sepsis, pneumonia and disseminated intravascular coagulation, where blood clots form throughout the circulatory system. The mother should have received antibiotics in pregnancy, the panel said. When the child was born there was a delay in recognising that she was in respiratory distress and in starting antibiotics and further treatment. There was no evidence of air embolism

From Dr Lees press statement

And then a screenshot below (as I can’t copy and paste from the Thirwall documents) of the pathologist who did the case studies of all the babies deaths from Alder Hey also states it wasn’t air embolism it was pneumonia and her findings were then doctored by someone else to imply differently

 

[joltz]

Baby four​

The baby girl was alleged to have died from the same cause as baby one, namely an injection of air into an intravenous line, leading to an air embolism that resulted in collapse, patchy discoloration of the skin and death.

The panel concluded that baby four had died from systemic sepsis, pneumonia and disseminated intravascular coagulation, where blood clots form throughout the circulatory system. The mother should have received antibiotics in pregnancy, the panel said. When the child was born there was a delay in recognising that she was in respiratory distress and in starting antibiotics and further treatment. There was no evidence of air embolism

From Dr Lees press statement

And then a screenshot below (as I can’t copy and paste from the Thirwall documents) of the pathologist who did the case studies of all the babies deaths from Alder Hey also states it wasn’t air embolism it was pneumonia and her findings were then doctored by someone else to imply differently

And yet a post-mortem found NO evidence of sepsis.

 

[mrC]

dr lee is ethere an expert or he isnt

 

[Furore]

Baby four​

The baby girl was alleged to have died from the same cause as baby one, namely an injection of air into an intravenous line, leading to an air embolism that resulted in collapse, patchy discoloration of the skin and death.

The panel concluded that baby four had died from systemic sepsis, pneumonia and disseminated intravascular coagulation, where blood clots form throughout the circulatory system. The mother should have received antibiotics in pregnancy, the panel said. When the child was born there was a delay in recognising that she was in respiratory distress and in starting antibiotics and further treatment. There was no evidence of air embolism

From Dr Lees press statement

And then a screenshot below (as I can’t copy and paste from the Thirwall documents) of the pathologist who did the case studies of all the babies deaths from Alder Hey also states it wasn’t air embolism it was pneumonia and her findings were then doctored by someone else to imply differently

I believe what these screenshots actually show is that the original pathologist was not aware of the suspicions of air embolus (a diagnosis notoriously difficult to diagnose at PM btw even if one is seeking it), and agreed there was the presence of pneumonia. As she herself agrees, death with pneumonia and death from pneumonia are not the same thing. The expert panel have been disingenuous with presenting pneumonia as novel evidence. It is this and other sleights of hand that make me distrust them somewhat IMO.

Likewise, mottling from cardiac arrest or sepsis is somewhat common, so it must have been slightly unusual for clinicians to remark it was special (before they’d even cottoned onto LL or any malicious intent involved in collapses). All JMO

How very concerning that Ian Harvey, the CEO, amended the pathologists own report to conclude the baby’s death was explained!!! He does not have jurisdiction to do that :O

 

[Ruthbullock]

And yet a post-mortem found NO evidence of sepsis.

I haven’t mentioned sepsis- I said pneumonia and it was found in the original post mortem

 

[marynnu]

I believe what these screenshots actually show is that the original pathologist was not aware of the suspicions of air embolus (a diagnosis notoriously difficult to diagnose at PM btw even if one is seeking it), and agreed there was the presence of pneumonia. As she herself agrees, death with pneumonia and death from pneumonia are not the same thing. The expert panel have been disingenuous with presenting pneumonia as novel evidence. It is this and other sleights of hand that make me distrust them somewhat IMO.

Likewise, mottling from cardiac arrest or sepsis is somewhat common, so it must have been slightly unusual for clinicians to remark it was special (before they’d even cottoned onto LL or any malicious intent involved in collapses). All JMO

How very concerning that Ian Harvey, the CEO, amended the pathologists own report to conclude the baby’s death was explained!!! He does not have jurisdiction to do that :O

Exactly. With due respect to Dr. Lee he was not present during these events. Several experienced nurses & doctors stated they had never seen anything like it. That has to count for something. It's evident that the rashes were not normal mottling, everyone knows what that looks like. And has anyone ever seen a rash that flits around? That's a bizarre observation, in my view.

 

[Furore]

Exactly. With due respect to Dr. Lee he was not present during these events. Several experienced nurses & doctors stated they had never seen anything like it. That has to count for something. It's evident that the rashes were not normal mottling, everyone knows what that looks like. And has anyone ever seen a rash that flits around? That's a bizarre observation, in my view.

A moving rash would anatomically fit indeed with a circulatory issue - be it arterial, venous, lymphatics…one of those being more dynamic than the others! JM
Btw emails from Ian Harvey here - clearly told deaths were unexplained https://thirlwall.public-inquiry.uk/wp-content/uploads/thirlwall-evidence/INQ0003124_01-02.pdf
and oral evidence here

https://thirlwall.public-inquiry.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Thirlwall-Inquiry-12-November-2024.pdf

This dude was dodgy AF IMHO!

 

[Ruthbullock]

I believe what these screenshots actually show is that the original pathologist was not aware of the suspicions of air embolus (a diagnosis notoriously difficult to diagnose at PM btw even if one is seeking it), and agreed there was the presence of pneumonia. As she herself agrees, death with pneumonia and death from pneumonia are not the same thing. The expert panel have been disingenuous with presenting pneumonia as novel evidence. It is this and other sleights of hand that make me distrust them somewhat IMO.

Likewise, mottling from cardiac arrest or sepsis is somewhat common, so it must have been slightly unusual for clinicians to remark it was special (before they’d even cottoned onto LL or any malicious intent involved in collapses). All JMO

How very concerning that Ian Harvey, the CEO, amended the pathologists own report to conclude the baby’s death was explained!!! He does not have jurisdiction to do that :O

This wasn’t the original pathologist- who also did say pneumonia, this was a second pathologist from Alder Hey who was asked to look at all the babies deaths- she also believes it was pneumonia, with the added complication of breathing difficulties from birth. So now we have 3 separate groups of people examining the evidence - the original pathologist, a second external pathologist and Dr Lee all saying the baby died through care failings and also having untreated pneumonia- yet somehow we still have the need for more experts to disagree with what was presented in the trial. I need to dig in, as it’s been a while, to re look at what was said at the trial about child d and the mottling.

 

[joltz]

I haven’t mentioned sepsis- I said pneumonia and it was found in the original post mortem

"The panel concluded that baby four had died from systemic sepsis'

 

[Furore]

Interestingly in oral evidence above Dr Hawdon even says “so my understanding of detailed forensic is that a much broader enquiry is taken into things that may not be in the casenotes. They may be in unit records, staffing records, equipment records”

Much like the actual trial no? Less like the casenotes review by Lee et al…

All JMO

 

[Furore]

This wasn’t the original pathologist- who also did say pneumonia, this was a second pathologist from Alder Hey who was asked to look at all the babies deaths- she also believes it was pneumonia, with the added complication of breathing difficulties from birth. So now we have 3 separate groups of people examining the evidence - the original pathologist, a second external pathologist and Dr Lee all saying the baby died through care failings and also having untreated pneumonia- yet somehow you still need more experts to disagree with what was presented in the trial. There are more experts speaking out disputing the findings in certain cases than there were making the jury decision.

I agree it should have been argued in the trial - but the defence didn’t present a single expert despite having had time to do so. This isolationist review of case notes (with a bias towards care failings) via press conference is disturbing. MOO