[Mackenzie]

A while ago I posted about our bleak situation with our adopted daughter. Many of you encouraged me to stick with her even though she seemed to have no attachment to us. I would like to thank those of you who encouraged me in that direction.

Two weeks ago I received a call from the residential home where she is living and was told they felt she needed to be taken to the ER. To make a long story short, her psychiatrist had put her on Lithium and neglected to make sure she had the required blood work done weekly to monitor the level in her blood stream. Needless to say her level was at 2.2 (normal is under 1.0 or below). She was in a confused state, could hardly walk due to balance being off, and could barely take care of herself. The staff at the home were extremely concerned about her which is why they called us. While at the hospital trying to determine what was causing her condition, I called her pschiatrist and his response was to take her back to the home and he would see her on Wed., 2 days later. I told him it was obvious her medication was causing this but he wasn't the least concerned. At that point I lost my patience with him and told him we were taking her home with us and there was no way I was giving her all of her medicine (9 different ones) until we found out which one was causing the problem. During the conversation the results of the blood work came back and we knew it was the Lithium and another drug he had just started her on causing her condition.

We did bring her home with us and kept her home Mon. - Thur. until she was able to start taking care of herself. She had hallucination all day on Tues., was obsessed with collecting things particularly books and it took until Sat. before she could start processing information of what was said to her. She would only sleep about 4 hours or she'd go to the other extreme and sleep 12 hours. It was an exhausting week.

It made me realize how important it was for us to stay a part of her life. After researching Lithium, I know now that it can have fatal results if it builds to high in the blood stream. Because of what we went through with her it helped a little with her attachment problems because I held her a lot and stayed with her at night until she could go to sleep. She is doing much better now and even the staff at the home said they would much rather have a little attitude from her than see her in the state she was in. We have given the doctor and the home instructions that she is not to be given any new medication unless it is okayed by us first and then she is only to be started on the lowest dose possible. I'm sure we will have many bumpy roads still ahead of us but I appreciate those of you who encouraged us to stick with her.

Thank you. Robin

[bajohnson]

I'm so sorry you had to go through that with your daughter. You sound like you are at peace with the decisions you've made. I would think about reporting that psychiatrist's neglect. The same thing happened to my brother and if my Mom hadn't caught it when she did, he would have died.
Take care, and God's hand on you and your family,
B

[kmalay]

Mackenzie I will second all of that statement from bajohnson. That dr needs to definitely get reported. I wish the best for your entire family.

[Mackenzie]

Who do you report a doctor to? Both of my older sons thought we should sue the doctor but I can't see getting into a legal battle but would like to report him to someone.

He has a reputation as the "Cocktail Doctor" because he apparently just keeps putting kids on more and more medicines. We wanted to change to our old psychiatrist she was seeing before she went into residential care but the home won't allow it. As long as she is living at the home she has to see the psychitrist that is contracted with them. We are fortunate that we legally adopted her before she went into residential care because it gives us the final say in how matters are handled while she is there. The majority of children in residential care are foster children and most don't have anyone looking out for them. It's scary to think of what would have happened to a child in foster care if the same thing had happened to them with no one to over look what the doctor was doing.

If anyone knows who to report this doctor to please let me know. Never once has he admitted he was at fault for neglecting to monitor her closer. When we meant with him later that week he just acted like it was no big deal and tried to make me feel bad for being so upset over the whole thing.

Any help would be welcome.

Robin

[kmalay]

I believe it would be the state medical board, but I would talke to the facility where your daughter is staying or the hospital they should be able to give you the proper contact information. Good luck and keep us posted