Giving birth is always a risky and dangerous experience, regardless of the way in which it is done. Still, in the modern age, when women give birth in hospitals, you don’t expect having a child to result in a fatality. Sadly, that’s what happened to Judge Glenda Hatchett’s daughter-in-law when she delivered a healthy baby boy via C-section.
According to Judge Hatchett’s son, Charles Johnson IV, his wife, Kira Adele Dixon, 39, as a “healthy, vibrant, fun and loving ” woman when she died 12 hours after delivering their second son on April 12, 2016.
As a result, Johnson is suing Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles for wrongful death and negligent infliction of emotional distress.
After giving birth to a son on September 18, 2014, at the same hospital, she returned to deliver her second son the same way.
According to court documents, Dixon’s c-section was performed by Arjang Naim, M.D., and assisted by Benham Kashanchi, M.D. Johnson was present in the delivery room.
Documents provide a detailed timeline of the day’s events.
“The delivery started at 2:31 p.m. Langston Johnson was born at 2:33 p.m. The procedure was completed at or about 2:48 p.m.” the documents read. “At 3:00 p.m., Kira was out of the operating room and taken to the Post Anesthesia Care Unit (PACU). … At 3:04 p.m., Kira was ‘skin to skin’ bonding with her baby.”
But by 5:00 p.m. there was blood-tinged urine in Dixon’s catheter.
Though they noticed the bloody urine at 5, Dr. Naim wasn’t notified of the concern of internal bleeding until 11:25 p.m.
When she was taken to surgery at 12:30 a.m., on the morning of April 13, doctors found 3 liters of blood in her abdomen.
“[Dixon] did not survive the ongoing massive blood loss,” the documents state. “[Dixon] was pronounced dead at 2:22 a.m. on April 13, 2016; and the autopsy stated that the cause of ‘death was due to hemorrhagic shock, due to acute hemoperitoneum,’ status post casarean section.”
The suit lists negligence as “failing to appreciate and properly manage Kira’s post-partum hemorrhage in a timely manner” and “failing to return Kira to surgery in a timely manner; among other acts and omissions. “As a direct and proximate result of said negligence of the defendants and the death of descendant, Plaintiffs have been and will continue to be deprived of the love, companionship, comfort, affection, society, solace, moral support, care, counsel, physical assistance, services, financial support and protection of descendant Kira, and have thereby sustained pecuniary loss.”
In response to the suit, Cedars-Sinai issued this statement.
“Cedars-Sinai is firmly committed to the highest levels of quality, has a comprehensive program to review any problems in patient care, and takes action any time it needs to make changes to maintain our high level of quality,” the hospital said in their statement. “Any time there are concerns raised about a patient’s medical care, we conduct an investigation to determine exactly what happened, including reviewing hospital procedures and the competency of healthcare providers, and make changes as needed to ensure that we continue to provide the highest quality medical care.”
Judge Hatchett appeared recently on HLN with her son and husband of the late Kira Dixon and this is what they had to say.
