PUBLISHER'S NOTE: Two important stories published this weekend (Saturday April 29, 2017) raise serious doubts, ten years later, about what was learned from the Gouge inquiry, which as the Toronto Star points out "exposed the devastating fallout of SickKids pathologist Charles Smith, the Hospital for Sick Children." In one of these articles, (Part One) the Star's Rachel Mendleson asks "What is ailing Sickkids?" - and investigates "how Toronto’s world-class children’s hospital missed the warning signs." As the Star points out: "A decade after a public inquiry exposed the devastating fallout of SickKids pathologist Charles Smith, the Hospital for Sick Children is grappling with Motherisk, another scandal involving families torn apart by flawed forensics. A Star investigation reveals lingering questions and a battle to rebuild public trust by an institution that can’t afford to get it wrong again." In the second story , Christie Blatchford, writes about "The uncomfortable questions once again being asked of Ontario’s chief pathologist," - Dr. Michael Pollanen - in the National Post, and asks, " How can it be that almost a decade after the Goudge inquiry released its report into the messy trail left behind by former SickKids’ pathologist Dr. Charles Smith, the white knight who rode in to build Ontario a new forensic service and save the day is now being asked uncomfortably familiar questions? "The white knight, of course, is Dr. Michael Pollanen," says Blatchford. "Ontario’s chief forensic pathologist since 2006, the year that allegations about Smith reached a critical mass and prompted a sweeping coroner’s review. It found that Smith had reached dubious conclusions of foul play in 20 child autopsies, some of which ended in wrongful convictions."
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STORY: "What’s ailing SickKids? How Toronto’s world-class children’s hospital missed the warning signs," by reporter Rachel Mendleson, published by The Toronto Star on April 29, 2017.
SUB-HEADING: "A decade after a public inquiry exposed the devastating fallout of SickKids pathologist Charles Smith, the Hospital for Sick Children is grappling with Motherisk, another scandal involving families torn apart by flawed forensics. A Star investigation reveals lingering questions and a battle to rebuild public trust by an institution that can’t afford to get it wrong again.
GIST: "When Brenda Waudby pulled up the article on her cellphone, she could barely process what she was reading. She can no longer remember the headline, but the words took her back to the most horrifying time in her life. The Hospital for Sick Children. Evidence. Unreliable. “I felt like throwing up,” she said. “It was like, ‘Oh my God. Here we go again.’” In 1997, Waudby was a single mom in Peterborough, Ont., recovering from cocaine addiction and the violent death of her 21-month-old daughter, Jenna Mellor, when SickKids pathologist Charles Smith ran a bulldozer through her life. Smith’s flawed opinions led police to charge Waudby for Jenna’s murder. It took years to regain custody of her two other children, clear her name and bring the real killer — Jenna’s 14-year-old babysitter — to justice. Smith’s faulty autopsy analyses tainted more than a dozen cases, including that of William Mullins-Johnson, who was jailed for 12 years after being wrongfully convicted in the 1993 death of his niece. In late April 2007, the province launched the
Goudge Inquiry into pediatric forensic pathology in Ontario and Smith. In the months that followed, Waudby was a regular in the public gallery on the 22nd floor of a grey office tower on Dundas St. West, as the evidence untangled a knot of systemic failings at some of the province’s most trusted institutions, including SickKids.
“I was really hopeful that they’d learned,” she said. “I was hopeful that the systems had corrected their issues.” That hope faded with news of Motherisk, another scandal involving a SickKids doctor, flawed forensics, marginalized parents and families torn apart. “It’s like we were disregarded. All we went through, that didn’t matter,” she said. “How could they forget so quickly?” (Rachel Mendleson's excellent feature is far too comprehensive to summarize. So, dear reader, read on. HL)
The entire story can be found at: