A young, pregnant patient, with severe head trauma, presented the doctors at the Ney Arias Lora Hospital with a serious ethical dilemma: risk the life of the mother and protect the fetus or safely treat the mother but kill the fetus. The patient, just 18, had received a severe head trauma after being hit by a rock. The injury became infected and the patient was at risk of meningitis, encephalitis or a cranial abscess, any of which could put her life at risk.
The head of the Neurosurgical Unit at the hospital, Dr. Lizardi de ls Cruz, explained the issues to reporters. The wound needed to be surgically cleaned out, but this is not a simple procedure because in the majority of cases, this requires general anesthesia. As a result of the anesthesia, the patient needed to be artificially ventilated, which would harm the fetus. In this case, the mother was adamant that the pregnancy not be terminated.
For the doctors there was also the issue of the Penal Code, which prohibits abortion in any form or at any time. The doctors took the risk and carried out the procedure under the technique of the surgical removal of a piece of the skull (craniotomy) while the patient was awake, which allowed the pregnancy to continue its normal course, although the patient might suffer infection at the site of the surgery.
The operation removed the broken pieces of her skull and the nearby infected material was drained. She is now on antibiotics and, according to the latest reports, recovering slowly. Sonograms of the fetus showed no issues.
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Diario Libre
2 December 2019