Callum Jones
A family have been awarded nearly $1 billion after details of how a hospital handled their baby's delivery were revealed.
Azaylee, 5, is likely to suffer a lifetime of disabilities due to the hospital’s negligence, according to a new report.
Remarkably, Third District Judge Patrick Corum in Salt Lake County said in his decision that mum Anyssa Zancanella ‘would have been better off delivering this baby at the bathroom of a gas station, or in a hut somewhere’ than in the usual safe space of a hospital.
Zancanella and the baby's father Danniel McMichael were in Salt Lake City on vacation in October 2019 when Azaylee decided she wanted to come into the world.
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The mother was forced to have her baby at the local hospital, where she was met with nurses who had only just finished their training the day she was admitted.
The 'inexperienced' nurses were accused of failing to react to signs that the baby was in distress on top of giving Zancanella ‘excessive’ doses of the labour-inducing drug Pitocin.
A lawsuit issued by the family claimed that while the nurses did call for a more experienced doctor about the baby’s concerning blood pressure and the woman’s fever, the on-call doctor decided to go back to sleep in a room next door.
Experts believe the baby was deprived of oxygen and suffered brain damage after staff performed a cesarean section delivery.
The damage is so bad that Azaylee will be disabled for life.
Azaylee had a ‘misshapen head’, ‘swollen’ face and bruising once she was delivered via the c-section.
The young child now needs care 24//7 due to regular seizures, while lawyers claim she doesn’t have the cognitive or executive function others do at her age.
And health experts think she will never be able to attend work, drive a car or go to school/college for her education.
"She is trapped. I know that my daughter is in there, but she can’t come out and I think of that every day,” Zancanella said.
Judge Corum awarded the family $951 million earlier this month following their terrible ordeal, after they found Steward Health Care liable.
"The person [Azaylee] was to be, the person she deserved to be, is trapped inside a brain-damaged child," Corum said. "I cannot think of anything more profound, total or complete than that loss."
The family may find it tricky collecting the money however as the hospital chain is bankrupt. Their lawyers said they were hoping to recoup half of the amount awarded to them.
LADbible Group has reached out to Steward Health Care for comment