By Kathleen Guthrie
Michael Kamrava, the Beverly Hills fertility specialist who transferred 12 embryos to Nadya Suleman and launched her career as “Octomom” (she delivered octuplets in 2008), has lost his medical license.
Read the full story here.
A judge initially recommended Kamrava be put on probation for five years for impregnating Suleman, who was already struggling to care for six children as an unemployed single mother. However, the medical review board of California, finding Kamrava “committed gross negligence, repeated negligent acts, and incompetence” in this case and at least two other cited cases, instead decided to pull his license.
It’s about f*&%ing time.
He claims he was just doing his job, by giving the patient what she wanted. I think what he did was unconscionable. What do you think?
Kathleen Guthrie is a Northern California–based freelance writer. She believes there is a special place in hell for the charlatans who take advantage of women struggling with infertility.
I couldn’t agree more, Kathleen. He indulged a mentally ill woman’s whims with no thought whatsoever as to whether or not she was capable of caring for additional children. Despicable.
I agree with the article that it is not the doctors right to decide how many children a woman can have, that being said, there is definitely something very wrong here. I totally FORGOT she had SIX before she had the eight. His defense is that she wanted a large family? Who doesn’t deem SIX, already a large family? Even Kate Gosselin had two and wanted one more and got six. Who has six, and struggles with invitro to have more?
I too feel very good about this decision. This women’s case has done nothing but add to the stigma of Assisted Reproductive Technology.
Just a note- I’m saying nothing against Kathleen, the author of this post-you are all my soul sisters. The proper term is “transfer” as in the doctor transfered 8 embryos into Nadia. No human can implant embryos, only transfer them and hope for implantation. Implantation is still such a mystery to the ART world and remains the elusive golden ticket for so many women such as myself who are experiencing unexplained infertility. This is such a common error, just wanted to promote knowledge of proper terminology 🙂
Lynn,
This is my error. Should have caught this before I posted it.
Thanks for pointing it out. It’s an important difference!
I will make the edit right away.
Lisa
Thanks, Lynn. I wasn’t aware of the proper term and I’m glad to be better educated about this.
I believe in a woman’s right to choose, but i totally agree with what Robin said. I think she is mentally ill and screening should have made it clear she should not be a candidate for further children.
I want a big family, too! But screening would show me not a candidate to carry a child due to disability. We don’t get what we want simply by wanting it.
I think it unconscionable that she now has 14 children. The saddest, and most telling of all this, when it happened, her oldest child was interviewed and he indicated he would prefer not to be part of that family. Now, interviews can take things out of context, but i think it is clear that the children she already had didn’t have a parent who was able to care for them. I do not want her to get more publicity, but i do wonder how that family is doing.
I can’t speak to how the family is doing emotionally, but Ms. Suleman appeared on an Oprah show this past season. She has appealed to Oprah for help because she was facing bankruptcy. Perhaps she was looking for a handout, but instead, Oprah has Suze Orman reach out and give her quite the wake-up call. It was very interesting. You can probably find it online at oprah.com.
I couldn’t agree with you more! The woman should NEVER have been allowed to have had such a procedure. The doctor didn’t think at all, what he saw was money and never considered the cost of his actions.
I find this so very sad – there are 14 children who are, inevitably, going to suffer in this story. And I feel glad that I live in a country where – though it might frustrate me at times – there are regulations that stop this kind of thing. No more than three embryos are transferred at a time, and now the government will pay for two IVF cycles if only one embryo is transferred each time.
And it makes me mad that people will think of her when they hear about “desperate infertile couples” – and not the sensible, loving, couples who simply want a family with children.
What a Dr was thinking transferring 12 embryos I do not know. She’d already given birth to six children – so clearly there was no need to assume that there was a problem with embryo quality or implantation. Or perhaps I do know what he was thinking … $$$$$$
Kathleen, I love your byline here “She believes there is a special place in hell for the charlatans who take advantage of women struggling with infertility.” Hear hear.
Even if she didn’t have the other kids and other issues – transferring 12 embryos is malpractice in and of itself. I’m glad he lost his license.
I had the same thoughts as Kate B right away. I was under the impression that transferring more than 3 embryos at once would put the mother and the entire pregnancy at risk. Take Suleman out this equation and it’s wrong regardless of who the transfer was done on. It’s about time they took his license away.
I am happy this loser of a doctor lost his license-did he not understand his oath as “first do no harm”? What an idiot he was by doing this for a single mother who already had enough children on her hands. Did he even bother to learn about her and her past history, six children, some with disabilities, and perhaps she may have a mental illness for the desire to have that many children without the means to support them?? Very selfish doctor – mentally ill patient – and hopefully the loss of his license will set a legal precedent that will prevent doctors from enabling these high risk pregnancies to continue. The new delivery of 6 children in PA is another example of medical incompetence, and all babies are in critical condition. Let us not have another Kate Gosselin on our hands and just let these people take care of these children on their own. They chose to do this and need to pay for these choices on their own!