Why was the pregnant mother prohibited from doing so?

Short of locking her in a room with no phone, taking away a cell, and forbidding visitors, how could they stop her from getting a lawyer?

Why does reduced fat Swiss cheese have twice as many holes are regular Swiss cheese?

Color of authority. Physician tells the nurses she's confined to the ward/floor/room and not allowed visitors or whatever, they put some hospital rent a cops outside the door, or whatever. Or it's quite possible that due to the emotional and crazy nature of the situation, plus not knowing her rights, the patient didn't realize she was being hosed until it was too late.

Never compromise.

Most people are not wired to question authority, especially medical authority.  Recently my child was in the emergency room for an infection/fever.  Had she been a few weeks older, they would have discharged her from the ER with antibiotics.  Instead she was admitted and a full battery of tests was run.  Which was fine - she was a little tiny baby and I wanted to be extra careful.

BUT - once they figured out the root cause, ruled out the really bad stuff, and determined a course of treatment, they wanted to keep us for several days after the fact - "just to be safe" and wait on the results of some other secondary tests.  I proposed that they release her, with an oral antibiotic, and that they fax the results to our doctor.  No dice.  Kept giving us the run-around.  But the basic problem was that they didn't really trust us to follow through with the baby's treatment plan, and were worried about liability if we didn't.

In the end we had to get downright nasty with the staff in order to be released.  At one point my wife asked "what will happen if I just get up and walk out of here with my child?"  I am sure they put us on a list of "trouble" patients.  We questioned everything, and made them explain exactly why every treatment/test was required.  Which I gathered from the staff's response was not at all the norm.

We questioned everything, and made them explain exactly why every treatment/test was required.  Which I gathered from the staff's response was not at all the norm.

Which is sad, because it should be. The first thing a medical provider is taught is that a patient needs to give informed consent (except in extreme or special cases). The key word is informed.  A patient can't do that unless they have been explained the risks and benefits of a drug, test or treatment. What should be commonplace is sadly very uncommon.

Never compromise.

The first thing a medical provider is taught is that a patient needs to give informed consent (except in extreme or special cases). The key word is informed.  A patient can't do that unless they have been explained the risks and benefits of a drug, test or treatment.

I agree with this, but I want to play devil's advocate for a moment here.  What if the majority of patients that a doctor sees in a day are incapable of being informed?  Heads so full of nonsense from third rate former sitcom stars, porn stars and/or religious fanatics that they are simply incapable of actually understanding the health risks of a particular course of action?  I don't think that this justifies forcing treatments on anyone, but I do think that a large part of the problem is that too many people either refuse to educate or are incapable of educating (or perhaps both) themselves about health issues, and separating the good medical advice from the bad.  
This isn't entirely confined to the willfully ignorant, either.  "Best practices" seem to shift with the wind sometimes - look at the controversies over mammogram screening, prostate screening, and hormone replacement therapy, among many others.  Can someone who's not a doctor or at least educated with a biological sciences background even hope to really understand this stuff?  At the end of the day most of us are just going to have to take it on the doctor's authority.  Even if we question what he/she is saying, at best we'll just go to another authority source (another doctor, or perhaps we'll read a little bit on the Internet to see if what the doctor says conforms with other authority sources we trust).  How informed can our consent really be in a situation like that?

Ce n'est pas une pipe. C'est une signature.

It's not going to be ideal, that's absolutely certain. That's why it should be critical to allow people a 2nd (or 3rd, or 4th) opinion if the patient desires it. If my insurance even covers 2nd opinions and insurance companies are stingy then I'd say this has value. Couple that without outside research in the case of non-emergencies and hopefully people can be more active participants in their education. I completely understand some people are complete idiots who are full of superstition and bad advice, but if the staff isn't even attempting to explain things or provide a second opinion as in the case of josh's baby (or this event here) then there is something majorly wrong.

Never compromise.

Couple that without outside research in the case of non-emergencies and hopefully people can be more active participants in their education. I completely understand some people are complete idiots who are full of superstition and bad advice, but if the staff isn't even attempting to explain things or provide a second opinion as in the case of josh's baby (or this event here) then there is something majorly wrong.

Agreed in josh's case, but in the Brown case the details are fuzzy enough that it's hard to say.  Perhaps the staff did try to explain things to Brown and she went into denial and refused to contemplate anything other than natural birth.  Clearly the fetus was in distress (since it ultimately died) - what is more of an emergency situation that that?  I could go as far a saying the hospital was right in not letting her leave - if she had left and then miscarried (which she undoubtedly would have), she might well have sued the hospital for letting her leave.  They were screwed either way.  The problem here is that "informed consent" notion.  Courts often seem to favor the patient here no matter what - if the patient insists on leaving and then suffers harm, the court ruling will be that the patient couldn't possibly have given informed consent.  If the same situation happens and the hospital doesn't let the patient leave, the court rules that the patient's rights were violated and that he could have given informed consent.  There really isn't a "safe" course of action for the hospital to take.  

I think perhaps in these circumstances we need to say that the initial consent came when you walked into the hospital and signed the paperwork - at that point you're saying that you need care and you're giving professionals some leeway in determining what that care should be, and particularly when you can leave.  The place where the line needs to be drawn is second opinions - once you're in care, there should never be a barrier to being passed off to another competent physician, as long as you can find one willing to take you.  If you disagree with a treatment option, if you request another physician then the original physician's liability for your care should end - any decisions made after that point shouldn't be held against him.  That's the one thing about this that I don't really understand - why was the hospital so unwilling to let someone else have a look at her?  Were they still afraid of some liability, or just so narcissisticly confident in their own ability they were unwilling to be second guessed?

Ce n'est pas une pipe. C'est une signature.

Damn...that's hardcore.  If something like that happened to me, I would immediately begin planning my escape.

Why does reduced fat Swiss cheese have twice as many holes are regular Swiss cheese?

Pretty much. That happens to me and it's on like donkey kong. Although that's assuming that a person put in that situation would be anything close to their right mind.

Never compromise.