Experts Say Octuplet Mom’s Doctor Was Wrong To Implant Eight Embryos

The Medical Board of california is now investigating the unidentified fertility doctor that treated Nadya Suleman, the mother of the octuplet babies born last week, as well as implanted her with embryos resulting in her previous six children. The board wants to know if there was “a violation of the standard of care.” Matt Lauer investigated this morning on The Today Show.

A lot of peole are looking at this doctor who knew the entire situation, the previous six children, Suleman’s financial situation and are asking if the doctor did the right thing. Lauer asked experts their thoughts.

We have strict guidelines about the number of embryos to transfer and this is well above what we recommend,” said Dr. Jaime Grifo, Director of the NYU Fertility Center. “Our guidelines say age 35 and under, two embryos is what we transfer. These are guidelines from our organization, the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. The fact that we’ve had good results since 1990 means that we’re all following the guidelines.”

Lauer asked exactly ow does a doctor make this decision.
“When you’re using technology that can make babies, eight babies all at once on top of six, then the doctor has to have some judgement to say ‘this isn’t the right environmnet for these kids to flourish,’ or ‘I dont’ want to make kids with disabilities.’ We’ve got to look out for the interest of kids,” said Arthur Caplan is the director of the center of Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania.

Lauer asked about the hypocratic oath and if that oath of ‘Do no harm,’ came into play at all with regards to this doctor.
“I think you’re going to have trouble with eight kids born at once, you’re definitely going to have prematurity,” Caplan said. “I don’t know of any birth of eight kids born at once that didn’t have disability, but when you add on another six, you’re going to have difficulty raising them.”

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