By LIBBY MIDDLEBROOK and NZPA
The parents of a baby paralysed at birth are complaining to the Health and Disability Commissioner over the way the birth was managed.
Jeff and Deanna Jones' son, Henk, suffered damage to the nerves in his neck when doctors were forced to wrench him from his mother's body, because at 5.7kg (12lb 12oz) he was too large for the birth canal.
His parents searched the world for a surgeon able to help, before finding one in Auckland, where he underwent a groundbreaking, 10-hour operation at KidzFirst Hospital at Middlemore.
Henk, now 2, faces two more operations to improve the use of his left arm, which he had been unable to bend since birth.
The Wellington couple say a caesarean birth would have prevented the injury, which occurred at Wellington Hospital when Henk's shoulder caught on his mother's pelvis, tearing the nerves in his neck - an injury known as erbs palsy.
Mrs Jones said the obstetrician she had consulted privately had pushed for a natural birth, despite knowing she was expecting a large baby, because she had already given birth naturally to another big baby.
"It makes me angry because we invested in a specialist believing he would know best," she said.
Henk's first operation, featured in the Herald just over a year ago, involved Auckland surgeon Glenn Bartlett grafting leg nerves on to the torn ends of the nerves in Henk's neck.
The new nerves have grown along Henk's arm at a rate of 1mm a day, helping to regenerate his arm muscles. He can now bend his elbow.
Mrs Jones said ACC had covered the cost of Henk's medical expenses, but no fault had been found with the obstetrician's conduct.
The Health Ministry recorded 61 cases of erbs palsy between July 1, 1999, and June 30 last year.
Worldwide, between two and three of every 1000 newborns are affected by erbs palsy, making the condition more common than Down syndrome or muscular dystrophy.
Birth trauma referred to commissioner
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