Royal Shrewsbury Hospital doctor cleared after joke over dying baby

Dr Sharon Oates made the "flippant" remark following the birth of Jenson Barnett, who died just 48 hours after his skull was fractured during delivery, at Royal Shrewsbury Hospital, in June 2013.

Doctors performed a Caesarian section after their attempts to help mother Kate Langford give birth naturally failed.

After the delivery, Dr Oates, a consultant in obstetrics and gynaecology, told Miss Langford and her fiance Andrew Barnett "you should smoke 50 cigarettes a day so you can have a smaller baby", the hearing was told.

Miss Langford, from Newtown in Powys, added that the doctor later said: "Sorry about your baby, we didn't anticipate it being as big as it was, it was never coming out of that little bottom."

Both remarks were made before Jenson's death.

The Medical Practitioners' Tribunal Service ruled that Dr Oates would face no further action for misconduct, although it criticised her for "an error in judgement".

An inquest held in Shrewsbury last year heard from a medical expert who said the baby need not have suffered injury if he had been born by Caesarian section earlier.

A post mortem examination revealed he had died from disseminated intravascular coagulation, which caused excessive blood loss, triggered by brain damage caused by the forceps delivery.

It also emerged that Dr Oates had previously been retrained following the death of another baby, who suffered brain damage as a result of a forceps delivery she carried out in 2007. Dr Oates only returned to her post in April 2012.

The tribunal said it accepted Dr Oates' explanation that the cigarette comment had been an "attempt at humour" during a stressful time.

But Miss Langford, who also has a 10-month-old-daughter Isla, said she thought it was "atrocious" for a doctor to speak to any patient in such a way.

A spokesman for Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust said it would consider the findings of the hearing.