Florida medical kidnapping trial begins; Netflix’s ‘Take Care of Maya’ case in spotlight.
Get ready for a gripping legal battle in Florida as a civil case involving medical kidnapping takes center stage. This case, which gained widespread attention on Netflix, revolves around parents who lost custody of their 10-year-old daughter after seeking medical treatment for her severe pain at a Florida children’s hospital.
In the Netflix documentary “Take Care of Maya,” the story of Maya Kowalski and her parents, Jack and Beata Kowalski, unfolds as they navigate Maya’s rare illness, Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS).
The heartbreaking story concludes with the tragic suicide of Mrs. Kowalski in January 2017, following the state’s decision to take custody of Maya and accusing the mother of Munchausen by Proxy, a rare mental disorder where caregivers fabricate illnesses in those under their care for attention.
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The Kowalski case sheds light on a nightmarish situation where parental rights are at stake, a situation that is becoming increasingly common as doctors specialize in child abuse pediatrics.
According to experts, when children with unusual or rare medical conditions seek emergency or hospital care, their cases may be reviewed by these specialists, leading to devastating consequences.
“As parents, we did everything we could for our children,” Mr. Kowalski expressed in the Netflix documentary. “But nothing could have prepared me for what I went through.”
Following Mrs. Kowalski’s tragic death, the Kowalskis filed a lawsuit against Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital, hospital social worker Catherine Bedy, and reached a settlement with Suncoast Center and its employee Dr. Sally Smith.
The lawsuit alleges that the hospital “imprisoned” their daughter and violated their constitutional rights as parents to make medical decisions for their child, a claim that Johns Hopkins denies.
Every Parent’s Nightmare
Dr. Eli Newberger, founder of the Child Protection Program at Boston Children’s Hospital, is an expert in identifying Munchausen by Proxy. Having been involved in over 200 cases, he began consulting on the misdiagnosis of child abuse after 1999.
Dr. Newberger informed The Epoch Times that the number of medical child abuse cases has significantly increased as more doctors specialize in child abuse pediatrics.
He believes that the diagnosis of medical child abuse is flawed because cases are necessary to secure funding for these specialized programs.
Dr. Newberger also pointed out that doctors specializing in pediatric child abuse often receive salaries from child protection agencies or prosecutors. He opposed the establishment of this specialty due to insufficient scientific support.
He emphasized that child protection agencies tend to accept doctor recommendations without independent review, and the focus of the specialty makes it more likely for a diagnosis of medical child abuse or an accusation of Munchausen by Proxy.
Dr. Newberger receives weekly calls from people seeking help, but his consultation schedule is backlogged until 2024. He only assists with cases that meet his standards and asserts that he is not a biased defense witness.
“These cases still keep me up at night,” he shared. “I mean, you read about it, you see that movie, and it’s very, very disturbing.”
Trapped in the System
Dr. Newberger warned that parents need to understand that they may not be able to leave a hospital with their child if they disagree with the doctors’ decisions.
He referred to research conducted by Maxine Eichner, a legal expert in medical child abuse at the University of North Carolina School of Law.
Eichner’s research paper titled “Bad Medicine: Parents, the State, and the Charge of ’Medical Child Abuse'” explores the rise in allegations of medical child abuse against parents who seek medical help for their children, which doctors deem unnecessary.
“The fact that this treatment has been ordered by other doctors does not protect parents from these accusations,” the paper stated.
The release of “Take Care of Maya” has resulted in numerous complaints from parents who claim they were wrongly accused of medical child abuse, according to attorney Nick Whitney.
“We’ve had to set up a separate intake system to catalog those cases. But we don’t have the manpower to handle all of the situations that we’ve heard about,” Mr. Whitney explained.
Medical Kidnapping
Mr. Whitney highlighted that hospitals can use the legal system to keep a child in their care, which he considers a form of medical kidnapping.
According to Mr. Whitney, Dr. Smith, the state investigator at Johns Hopkins, had conversations with Maya Kowalski’s specialists who confirmed her CRPS diagnosis and stated that the case did not involve child abuse. However, Dr. Smith allegedly withheld this information and did not bring it to the court’s attention during the custody proceedings.
Johns Hopkins responded to The Epoch Times, stating that privacy laws limit their ability to comment but emphasizing their commitment to the safety and privacy of their patients. They explained that their staff is required by law to report suspected abuse or neglect to the Department of Children and Families (DCF), and it is the DCF and a judge who investigate the situation and make decisions in the child’s best interest.
Dr. Newberger, familiar with the Kowalski case, noted that although Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore has a CRPS expert on staff, they failed to integrate their clinical services with the hospital in St. Petersburg.
In complex cases, general pediatricians often rely on experts in pediatric child abuse to handle the issues, according to Dr. Newberger.
Eichner’s research indicated that child protection officials generally support doctors who accuse parents of wrongdoing. In some cases, parents even face criminal charges for perceived “overtreatment,” and judges tend to treat such charges as credible claims of child abuse.
According to Eichner’s paper, the diagnostic net for medical child abuse captures “many loving parents making the best decisions they can for their genuinely sick children.”
The Kowalski Case
The Kowalski family’s ordeal began when their 9-year-old daughter, Maya, was admitted to Johns Hopkins in July 2015 for an asthma attack. During her hospital stay, she started experiencing severe pain and weakness, leading to a diagnosis of CRPS in the fall of 2015.
CRPS, a poorly understood chronic neurological condition, causes widespread pain and inflammation due to nerve fiber damage or dysfunction, as explained by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.
Upon the advice of CRPS specialists, the Kowalskis took Maya to Mexico for specialized Ketamine infusion therapy. She continued to receive Ketamine infusions afterward.
In October 2016, Maya was admitted to the ER at Johns Hopkins with a severe stomachache after her neurologist, Dr. Ashraf Hanna, advised her father to take her to the hospital. However, according to the lawsuit, the hospital wanted Maya to undergo treatments that her parents considered unnecessary.
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