LONDON, England, January 8, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) — A U.K. mother is blasting staff at St. George’s Hospital who she says advised her to have an abortion after misdiagnosing her unborn child with a rare and painful genetic condition that causes brittle bones.
But Kamelia Walters ignored the advice and gave birth to a healthy baby girl 18 months ago, she told the Sun Online in an exclusive interview.
Walters, 25, said she went to St. George’s for an ultrasound scan in January 2016.
At that time, the technician called in a consultant who told the young mother her unborn baby had bone fractures.
Doctors at the hospital then told Walters her daughter “probably” had osteogenesis imperfecta type 3, according to the Sun.
Osteogenesis imperfecta causes fragile bones, so individuals with the condition often suffer multiple bone fractures. It also affects the internal organs, and symptoms can include respiratory problems, bone deformity, spine curvatures, fractures of the vertebrae, and hearing loss.
“They started telling me I could get an abortion,” Walters told the Sun Online.
“I was just petrified when I came home that day,” she said. “I was just crying to my mum and she said she didn’t believe it because nobody in my family has anything like that.”
Walters and her partner, 27-year-old Lamar Anderson, also refused a test doctors told them would give a 100 percent accurate diagnosis, but which carried a risk of miscarriage.
When her baby, Kyla-Shae, was born, she was told the baby was normal, Walters told the Sun.
“I knew already somehow that there was nothing wrong with her and when she was born it just confirmed it.”
But Walters is outraged that had she followed the doctors’ advice, she would have aborted her baby, she told the Sun Online.
Meanwhile, she has since given birth to a second healthy daughter, Kyarah.
A spokesperson for St. George’s told the Sun the hospital couldn’t comment on individual cases, but that it “would welcome the opportunity to meet with her on an individual basis to discuss the concerns she has raised.”