Babies are bleeding to death when parents avoid routine vitamin K shots

Some doctors failed to recognize the role of vitamin K when the baby entered their emergency room, not knowing how to reverse the damage of the shot that was reduced. Many of them encountered this problem only in medical school textbooks.

Some hospitals are starting to use their numbers, but the effort is still a long way off. The data is usually stored in-house, so there is not much information about this problem. Recognizing the urgency of the matter, a few hospital officials have agreed to share what they know with ProPublica.

The doctors of St. Louis-based Mercy, which runs fertility clinics in Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas, began noticing that families were refusing vitamin K shots during the pandemic. Last year, 1,552 babies in all Mercy hospitals were not vaccinated. In 2021, this number was 536.

And at Idaho’s largest hospital, rejection rates have risen every year since the outbreak began, and in some cases have doubled. In 2020, 3.8 percent of households in St. Luke’s Health System refused to give vitamin K shots to their children. In 2025, this number will increase to 9.8 percent. One hospital even reached 20 percent of infants who did not receive vitamin K injections.

At least two children who are supported in St. Luke’s died last year from complications related to vitamin K deficiency, hospital officials confirmed. But Dr. Tom Patterson, a pediatrician who cares for newborns in some St. Louis hospitals.

Patterson recently pleaded with a family to allow their son to be shot. The man refused and surprised the doctor by continuing. She went to the nurses to complain that Patterson was pushing the issue.

How we told the story

As part of our reporting, ProPublica contacted 55 hospitals and birth centers in the US; asked more than 30 doctors; and submitted approximately 90 written requests to state and local health departments, medical examiners, and other agencies. ProPublica also analyzed data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and reviewed hundreds of medical and autopsy records.

This article appeared first ProPublica.