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Baby died sleeping in mother’s bed
Boy born prematurely months earlier found dead by mother as she cradled him in her arms
A MOTHER who fell asleep while breast-feeding her baby in bed woke up to find he was dead, an inquest heard.
Monikar Thacker took her five-month-old son Vijay into her bed with her husband from the Moses basket where he was sleeping at their flat in The Water Gardens, off Edgware Road, early in the morning during October last year because he would not settle. Half an hour later she awoke to discover he had died in her arms.
At Westminster Coroner’s Court on Friday, Vijay’s father Pankaj Thacker, described how he tried to resuscitate his son, who had suffered with a number of medical problems since his premature birth at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington in April.
Mrs Thacker was still cradling the baby, when paramedics arrived at the house at 7.30am.
Westminster Coroner Dr Paul Knapman ruled out death by smothering and also said that the infant’s prematurity was not the cause because his condition was improving, recording a verdict of sudden infant death syndrome – more commonly known as “cot death”.
The court heard how Vijay was born at the “extremes of survival” weighing just 625 grams – so premature that if he had died it would have been declared a still-birth.
He was only thought fit to leave hospital after four months under observation at St Mary’s.
After his birth Vijay suffered with chronic lung disease, pulmonary artery hypertension, weak bones and mild liver disease and the court heard how he had already survived a cardiac arrest at just 81 days old when his ribs were broken during the successful resuscitation.
Despite his complications, Dr Ton Lissauer, a neonatal consultant at the hospital, said Vijay stood a good chance of survival.
Sudden infant death syndrome normally refers to an unexplained death of an apparently healthy infant aged between one month and one year. |
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