His eldest son, now 15, was born with him Lesch-Nyhan syndrome, a rare congenital disease characterized by self-destructive behavior. The child bites the fingertips, bursts his lips, and insults and hits the people around him.
After having the tests to rule out the syndrome when she became pregnant with her third child, and despite being told that she was healthy, her baby was born with the same disease as her older brother. An ordeal for parents for which the Canary health service was sentenced to pay compensation of 1.3 million euros for the "error".
Error in diagnosis
When she became pregnant with her second child, the couple decided to undergo a prenatal test to detect chromosomal abnormalities. The tests were negative and his son, who is now five years old, was born healthy.
He did the same when he became pregnant with his third baby. With three months of pregnancy she underwent a chorionic biopsy to know if she was a carrier of the syndrome or not. Although they assured him that his baby was not affected, three months after he was born the pediatrician saw something strange and after performing a blood test, they confirmed that he was affected by the same syndrome as his older brother.
AdvertisingThe Maternal and Child Hospital of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, where the biopsy was performed, has just been ordered to pay compensation of 1.3 million euros to parents by error in the diagnosis.
According to the sentence, the analyzed sample was contaminated with the mother's genetic material, circumstance that was never communicated to the parents, who continued with the pregnancy believing that their baby was healthy.
What is Lesch-Nyhan Syndrome
Lesch-Nyhan syndrome is a hereditary disease that affects the way the body produces and breaks down purines, a normal part of human tissue.
It is transmitted as a sex-linked trait, or an X-linked trait, and mostly It occurs in boys. It is included in the group of congenital metabolism errors.
It affects one in every 380,000 live births (there are 60 cases in Spain) and is characterized by three main symptoms: neurological dysfunction, cognitive and behavioral disorders and increase or overproduction of uric acid.
Children with this syndrome have delayed motor development and severe disabilityThey can't walk and need a wheelchair to move.
