€30k award for woman distressed by videoing of birth in CUMH
Laura O’Neill, of 29 Hillcrest Avenue, Blarney Rd, Cork, gave birth at the hospital on April 8, 2014, but she said she was very distressed to find that the birth was video-recorded.
Judge Gerard O’Brien found in her favour yesterday and made an award of €30,000 against the Health Service Executive (HSE).
The judge said the doctors involved in the educational research, which required the filming of a procedure, did not do anything wrong. He also said that such educational processes were vital in the education of young medical professionals.
However, he found fault with the system used for giving the patient an opportunity to consent to having a procedure video-recorded.
The judge said the procedure to be filmed related to the application of an epidural.
The woman giving birth could only opt for the epidural during the process of labour and was only asked for her consent to be filmed after this was requested.
Judge O’Brien said that because of a patient’s level of stress at this time, she may not be in a position to give a calm, reasonable decision on giving consent.
“I must find for the plaintiff. I make no criticism of the doctors,” the judge said.
The defence in the case was that the patient was asked if she consented to the videoing and that she did consent. This was disputed.
Judge O’Brien recalled during the judgment yesterday in the civil action at Cork Circuit Court that as soon as it was brought to the attention of staff that Ms O’Neill was unhappy about the video recording she was told there was no problem and that it would be deleted immediately as she always had the authority to withdraw her consent.
The plaintiff’s barrister, Denise Mulcahy, said that no written consent was given and that if — as the defence contended — she was asked if she consented when she was in the labour ward, then she could well have been confused and distressed and that this would have been a totally unsuitable time to ask for consent.
Ms Mulcahy argued it was not sufficient for the doctor to say he perceived she had the capacity to give consent.
Anaesthesiologist Colm Lane said the only time the epidural could be requested was in the labour ward on the day of the birth. The medical study was concerned with procedures related to epidural.
