Philly hospital wants to pull the plug — NJ boy’s mom seeks help
A desperate New Jersey mother is seeking help in a legal fight against a renowned Philadelphia hospital that wants to take her 14-year-old son off life support.
Areen Chakrabarti was admitted to the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia on April 15 with severe smoke inhalation a day after he was rescued from his family's burning Fielsboro home.
From the start, doctors at CHOP wanted to take Areen off life support, saying that he was brain dead.
But his mother insists she can still feel life in him and the family's attorney says lack of neurological activity in the brain does not necessarily mean there is no hope for revival.
On Friday, a Philadelphia judge granted the family a reprieve, moving their case to Orphans' Court, where attorney Christopher Bagnato says the case could stretch weeks or months, providing the family time in order to find a facility that will admit Areen for treatment.
In the meantime, the family is searching for a new facility and asking friends and the public to contribute toward the cost of medical bills.
"I am a single mom, my only child, my son Areen, had severe brain injury due to a house fire and has been in hospital in deep coma," Rumpa Banerjee wrote on a GoFundMe page that had raised $125 by Saturday morning. "I know my son is alive and will come back to me, he just needs some time to recover from the trauma."
The case raises the question of when a hospital can pull the plug on a patient.
While New Jersey has a religious exemption for the concept of being "brain dead," the law in Pennsylvania does not. But Bagnato says that does not mean the hospital can end life support without a guardian's permission. In his petition to the court, Bagnato points to a 2013 Pennsylvania Superior Court decision that said a hospital was wrong to ignore the wishes of a guardian who objected to removing a patient from life support.
The Philadelphia case has shades of a raging British controversy involving terminally ill toddler Alfie Evans, who was taken off life support because doctors say further treatment for his incurable degenerative neurological condition is futile. His parents lost a court fight for the right to take Alfie to a hospital in Italy, where he would be kept on life support.
The Associated Press contribute to this report.
Sergio Bichao is deputy digital editor at New Jersey 101.5. Send him news tips: Call 609-359-5348 or email sergio.bichao@townsquaremedia.com.
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