Baby’s Head ‘Almost Falls Off’: The Reason Is Terrifying

A baby’s head reportedly “almost fell off” after medical staff at Cairns Base Hospital in Australia assumed that something on the child’s X-ray was “just a shirt button,” reports the Daily Mail.

As most parents know, it can be difficult keeping floors clean enough so that their little ones can be completely safe.

If there is something that can be taken from the floor and put in the mouth, a child will find it. Unfortunately for Baby Oscar, 4-months-old at the time of the incident, the object he found was a small lithium battery.

As a result of the misdiagnosis, Oscar’s parents said, the battery “corroded” the infant’s spine to the point that his head “almost fell off” and forced the child into a full body cast for eight grueling months.

The issues started when Oscar was having difficulty breathing. That’s when his father, Colin, took him to Mossman Hospital, who did the X-rays. As his condition grew worse, that’s when he was taken to Cairns Base.

It took 15 hours for doctors to remove the item, which they had initially believed to be a shirt button. Oscar’s parents were then allowed to take him home, but they were right back in the emergency room a day later when the child began “frothing at the mouth.”

After another four weeks had passed, Colin returned with the boy, noting that the baby’s head had “almost fallen off” and that he was “near death.”

This was in part due to the fact that the battery had destroyed three of the child’s vertebrae. Oscar was eventually placed into an induced coma and taken to Brisbane’s Royal Children’s Hospital. The family is now pursuing legal action against the hospitals that failed to diagnose in a timely manner.

While Oscar is now 5-years-old, he will have restricted movements for the rest of his life and cannot fully raise his head. Even so, he is fortunate when compared to Summer Steer, a 4-year-old who died in 2013 from ingesting a lithium battery due to “cardiac arrest.”

Bill King, head of the Medical Negligence department, explained what happens to cause so much damage in cases like that of Steer and baby Oscar.

“The battery reacted with the child’s saliva and caused severe tissue damage including damage to his esophagus and his cervical spine; fusing 3 of his discs and greatly restricting his range of motion.”

In Steer’s case, it was too late, but for Oscar, he does have a future.

https://youtu.be/0JZBg4kotj0

Medical experts are warning parents to be careful with a child’s access to lithium batteries, noting that their “shininess” can be appealing to little ones and that many of the early symptoms of ingestion can follow basic childhood ailments — namely coughing, chest pain, vomiting, and fever.

If a baby’s head can almost fall off due to lithium batteries, do you think there should be stricter controls on how these are housed in toys and electronic devices? Sound off in the comments section.

[Image of baby’s head in cast via Daily Mail, linked above]