Stay away from Dr. Thum. Over three years ago I came to the end of what should have been a completely normal pregnancy. I was overdue to have my child and started having severe abdominal pain in the middle of the night. I went to the triage room in the maternity ward of St. Vincent's. They hooked me up to a fetal monitor...my baby's heart rate looked great at the time. No one took my temperature, pulse, respiration, etc....all I got was the fetal monitor. Dr. Thum came to see me after my husband and I had been "napping" for hours in the triage room. After a look at the fetal heart rate, I was told that I was an anxious first time mom and that I needed to go home. I knew that something was wrong with me and would not leave until they took my temperature (what if I had appendicitis??) and checked my baby out via ultrasound. They took my temp - it was normal at the time - and they checked my son out via ultrasound...and said "maybe his elbow is pinching you somewhere." I knew that something was terribly wrong, but had no ammunition to fight Dr. Thum and the nurse....how was I to know more about maternal complications than they were? I left the hospital with my husband...still in great pain. Two days later I woke up and had bloody discharge. My water broke shortly after - there was meconium in the water so I was a little panicked and we hustled to get into the maternity ward at St. V's. (Keep in mind that I had been 3cm dilated and contracting every 6 minutes for the last three weeks of my pregnancy...I just wasn't admitted to the hospital because I didn't fit the guidelines for being admitted). I was 6cm dilated on arrival and dilating 1cm every 10 minutes vs. every hour. My son had an extremely high heart rate...labeled "non-reassuring heart rate." Dr. Jean-Baptiste asked me if I wanted to wait 20 minutes to deliver vaginally? I told her that if my baby's life was in danger, that she should take him out immediately. My son's heart rate did not stabilize and I was brought in for an emergency c-section. Dr. Thum came on shift just as Dr. Jean-Baptiste was performing the c-section, so she joined her in the operating room. Dr. Jean-Baptiste performed the c-section, and she was technically very sound as far as the operation went. She had a calm and detached demeanor (good under pressure). My son was born, his lungs were suctioned out, and he turned out ok. They kept me in the hospital for close to 5 days...and told me I had a fever and that I must have some sort of infection. No one ever provided a diagnosis to me or anything. After 6 weeks had passed and I went in for my postpartum appt., Dr. Thum looked up some information in my electronic charts. I sat there in the room as she was reading through info, my son in his car seat by my side. She read some info and then kept looking back at my son, almost analyzing him and it really creeped me out. She made some comments to me like "oh - you must have had an infection because you were in labor so long," but that's all she said. I left the office and immediately went home and googled my symptoms while in the hospital. From what I read on the internet, I diagnosed myself with chorioamnionitis. I went in later for an annual exam with Susan Mitchell-Miller (who is amazing) and had her pull up my lab results from the pregnancy. I looked through the notations myself and confirmed with Susan that my placenta had been analyzed by the histology lab and I had both chorioamnionitis and funisitis. Translation: the entire environment that my baby had been floating around in (placenta, umbilical cord) were completely infected and breaking down. I later read that 1 out of 4 children born at term to mothers with chorioamnionitis end up with cerebral palsy. Some die. The "cure" for chorioamnionitis is to deliver a baby IMMEDIATELY. I went to Dr. Thum two days before my son's birth and complained of the CLASSIC symptoms of chorioamnionitis...and I was called a "paranoid first time mom." I was sent home when my child should have been delivered. My son has had seizures (last summer) and other issues that make me wonder whether or not his brain was impacted in some way by hanging out in an infected environment for so long. I DO NOT TRUST Dr. Thum. In doing additonal research, I also found a lawsuit that she was involved in (google "Angela Desbiens" for that story) where Angela couldn't feel her baby moving any more...went into the hospital and was also dismissed. Her baby had seizures shortly after birth and is now brain dead. It's up to you whether or not you're comfortable with a Dr. who dismisses serious complaints, but I'm not. And guess what...all the doctors at that clinic share a medical malpractice license...so you don't get to choose who delivers your baby. The only thing that really matters is the delivery (with a normal pregnancy). Any Dr. at the clinic can measure you, analyze your pee, etc.....but in the end the only thing that matters at delivery time is the Dr. and you cannot choose which one you will end up with.
