Embryo Swapping

Another example of 'patient mis-identification' with the patient in this case being either the wrong mother or the wrong embryo -- take your pick:

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090922/NEWS16/909220358

Note that in this case, the mother chose to continue the pregnancy even though the wrong embryo had been implanted. The article goes on to list a similar case where the mother chose to terminate the pregnancy.

Baby Swapping as Patient Mis-Identification

A 2003 story out of Boston highlighted a baby swapping incident as an instance of the broader problem of patient mis-identification:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2003/09/26/hospital_baby_mixup_renews_old_fears?mode=pf
In this particular case, the mother recognized that the infant given to her to nurse was not her own. What is of interest here is the frequency with which patient mis-identification occurs in hospitals -- with baby-swapping being only a particular example. Despite elaborate procedures to prevent these cases, they occur with depressing regularity.

More Baby Swapping

Another instance of baby swapping surfaced in the press this week. Although the actually swapping occurred in 1953, the exchange of two baby girls in a hospital in Washington state only came to light recently. DNA testing confirmed that the girls had been exchanged while being bathed by nurses. Here’s a link:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_switched_at_birth

 

 

Modern Baby Swapping

A case of baby swapping in a modern hospital came to light recently. In this case, the substitution was discovered after the baby girl was given to the wrong mother to breastfeed just once, but it illustrates that even with better infant identification routines, mistakes happen. Here’s the story:

http://seacoastonline.com/articles/20090405-NEWS-904050348?tastethesametome

An Example of Baby Swapping

I subscribe to the podcast of This American Life. A recent podcast called “Switched at Birth” offers an interesting example of what we talked about earlier as ‘Baby Swapping’. In this case, two baby girls were born in the same delivery room within minutes of each other and accidentally switched on their way to the nursery. One mother suspected the switch but didn’t tell the daughters until they were 43 years old. The podcast is at:

 http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=360

Baby Swapping

Some Non-Paternity Events are the result of what might be called baby swapping. That is, one baby is substituted for another.

For the last century or so many children have been born in hospitals rather than at home. Babies are kept in nurseries with many others and delivered to their mothers periodically to be fed. Despite precautions, sometimes babies get mixed up and the switch is not recognized. In one notorious case, two baby girls were switched and the substitution was not recognized for more than a decade. The substitution came to light when one of the girls died and it became apparent that the cause of death was an inherited condition. The family that thought she was their daughter could not have transmitted the disorder. Eventually, the other girl was identified – the mother in the family that she had been living with had died of the same disorder as the other daughter. DNA testing confirmed that the girls had been switched. The widower, the surviving girl and the biological parents were then faced with the dilemma of which family should be raising the girl. The girl chose to stay with the man who had raised her, at least initially.

The point of this tragic story is just that babies do get mixed up accidentally. It is also the case that sometimes the switch is done deliberately. For example, if a baby was a stillbirth or born sickly and died soon after birth, an orphaned or illegitimate baby was sometimes substituted. This might be done to insure an heir to a family or to simultaneously comfort the bereaved mother and solve the problem of the orphaned or bastard child. In either case, the substitution can result in DNA mismatches down the road. Hospital births and mandatory birth registration have reduced this deliberate substitution, but not eliminated it.