Here we have the duty of reporting an update regarding another Canadian tragedy, the coroner’s report regarding the 2002 death of month-old baby boy Ryleigh Roman Bryan McWillis. The coroner concluded that he died after excessive bleeding following a circumcision.
Baby’s death spurs hospital changes
Sun, February 15, 2004
By CP
PENTICTON, B.C. — A coroner looking into the death of a month-old boy who died of complications after being circumcised has said an instruction method ensuring the family’s understanding of how to care for the infant after the surgery would have been helpful. Ryleigh McWillis died in a Vancouver hospital on Aug. 22, 2002, two days after he was circumcised in an elective day procedure at Penticton Regional Hospital.
His parents took him home after the surgery, but brought him back to the Okanagan hospital early the next morning when they discovered his diaper was soaked with blood.
He was transferred to a Vancouver hospital.
In a report released this week, coroner Chico Newell acknowledged there were concerns about the communication from health providers to Ryleigh’s parents. “Although health-care personnel provided explicit and thorough instructions for Ryleigh’s care, his family did not understand them in the way health providers intended,” Newell wrote.
Tanna McWillis, the infant’s mother, said earlier this week she didn’t think the coroner’s report went far enough.
The Penticton hospital updated its circumcision procedure prior to the release of the coroner’s report, said Lorraine Ferguson, a community health administrator for the Interior Health Authority.
Parents of newly circumcised infants should call the hospital at 5 p.m. on the day the baby is sent home, Ferguson said. An instruction sheet given to parents also outlines what to check for in terms of bleeding.