Court Grants Texas Baby Emergency Relief, Hospital Cannot Stop Life Support During Appeal
CBN News has learned the 2nd Court of Appeals in Fort Worth, Texas has granted Tinslee Lewis emergency relief, meaning the hospital cannot stop her life support while the appeal is pending.
The date of her appeal has not been set, according to Texas Right to Life, a pro-life organization, who's helping Trinity Lewis, Tinslee's mother with her appeal.
The emergency relief comes in response to a Texas judge's decision Thursday that denied the 11-month-old a temporary injunction seeking to stop the Cook Children's Medical Center from stopping her life support.
As CBN News reported, doctors at the hospital had planned to remove Tinslee from life support Nov. 10 after invoking the state's "10-day rule" which can be employed when a family disagrees with doctors who say life-sustaining treatment should be stopped. The law stipulates that if the hospital's ethics committee agrees with doctors, treatment can be withdrawn after 10 days if a new provider can't be found to take the patient.
Hospital officials have said they reached out to more than 20 facilities to see if one would take Tinslee, but all agreed that further care is futile.
Tinslee has been at Cook Children's since her premature birth. The hospital said she has a rare heart defect and suffers from chronic lung disease and severe chronic high blood pressure. She hasn't come off a ventilator since going into respiratory arrest in early July and requires full respiratory and cardiac support, deep sedation and to be medically paralyzed. The hospital said doctors believe she's suffering.
Lewis testified at a hearing last month that despite her daughter's sedation, she has a sense of the girl's likes and dislikes, describing her as "sassy." Tinslee enjoys the animated musical "Trolls" and cries when it ends, the mother said.
"I want to be the one to make the decision for her," Lewis said, about removing her daughter from life support.
The 2nd Court of Appeals will be the same court to hear Baby Tinslee's appeal regarding whether she can have a temporary injunction, which would grant her more time, and examine the constitutionality of the deadly 10-Day Rule.
In an email to CBN News on Thursday, Kimberlyn Schwartz, director of media and communication for Texas Right to Life wrote, " The 10-Day Rule has robbed countless patients of their Right to Life and the right to due process. We pray the appellate court will identify how the law violates Baby Tinslee's due process rights, revoke her death sentence, and strike down the deadly 10-Day Rule."
