Medically-induced murder/death by IV??

[matrixrefugee]

Googled "medically induced death", which lead to a lot of doctor-bashing articles on natural health sites. Whut

Comments

warning for possible triggers on infanticide

[twistedsheets10]

I know you mentioned suffocation as not viable, but couldn't that be explained as the child smothering himself/herself by accident? Wasn't there women who got away from killing so many of her kids (via smothering) by using SIDS as the cause?

Also, in the past, there was a practice in Japan for unwanted children where they put wet rice paper over the mouth and nose of the newborn, so it can't breathe.

Re: warning for possible triggers on infanticide

[marycatelli]

a plastic bag would achieve the same effect, providing he could be sure of removing it before someone noticed the death.

There was a woman who smothered a whole sequence of babies and got written up medically as proof that SIDS ran in families.

Re: warning for possible triggers on infanticide

[twistedsheets10]

Yeah, I remember that case now...Waneta Hoyt, I think that was her name.

[sockdrawerdemon]

Air bubble?

[lindenfoxcub]

yep, that's been used in at least one crime show I've seen. Impossible to detect, no toxin - in the show I saw, they had to get the murderer to confess, and only picked up on it because she was working in an old folks home and doing it repeatedly.

[lil_shepherd]

Except that it doesn't work, at least no most of the time. Dorothy Sayers, who originated this tripe trope, has come under a lot of criticism for this, as many people accept it without checking.

(I wonder how many attempted murders haven't worked because people think Sayers must have known what she was talking about?)

[sockdrawerdemon]

I've never heard of Sayers, I just mentioned it because we are always so careful with air in IV's with small animals at my surgery.

[jo_fitz]

Smothering with like a pillow is totally possiable and could easily be mistaken for SIDS. An infant death probably wouldn't be questioned in such circumstances.
You should watch Deadly Women

[lady_ravenlocke]

Seconded. On Deadly Women (available via Netflix if you have access), they talk about several women who kill infants.

[jaguarx13]

He doesn't need a drug in the IV, just an air bubble.

[lil_shepherd]

*Sigh*

Dorothy Sayers has a lot to answer for...

[jaguarx13]

Actually, if the air bubble is large enough, it causes a vapor lock scenario, just like air in the fuel line of an engine. If the air embolus is large enough, when it reaches the heart, the heart has nothing to squeeze or gain purchase on, and blood flow stops. The heart stops next. There are many ways air can get into the blood stream - when blood vessels are cut curing surgery, if you ascend too quickly when scuba diving,and if air is injected through an in IV. How much air is enough to do damage (but not be fatal) - around 20 milliliters How much is needed to be fatal? In 1949 Dr. Herman Sander ended the life of a terminally ill cancer patient by injecting 40 milliliters of air - four syringes of 10 ml each. The Nazis also used it as a method to kill mentally ill inmates in the Meseritz-Obrawalde hospital in 1942. There was another spree of killings by air injections in Germany decades later when a nurse injected 60 - 115 ml of air into the veins of 15 terminally ill elderly patients, who all died. So yes, it is possible,

[mydocuments]

A bolus dose of potassium chloride would do it. By theitime the autopsy us done, I think that the blood chemistry wouldn't reveal anything wonky.

[surgicalsteel]

Agreed. Potassium's something that's normally present in fairly large amounts intracellularly. Cells start breaking down and releasing their potassium as someone decomposes, which is why this is really hard to detect.