Octomom Doctor Loses Medical License

While the birth of one baby may be cause for celebration, the birth of eight babies can be cause for the end of a career.

The California medical board ruled this week that Dr. Michael Kamrava, the fertility doctor who treated Octomom Nadya Suleman, “did not exercise sound judgement” when he implanted Suleman with 12 embryos in July 2008.  This case, along with 2 other cases in which Kamrava was found negligent, was taken into consideration before the panel ruled to revoke Dr. Kamrava’s medical license, effective next month.

The American Society of Reproductive Medicine says suggests doctors should not implant more than two embryos in women under the age of 35, and no more than five embryos in women over 40.  Suleman was 33 when she gave birth to the octuplets.

When the octuplets were born in January 2009, the news was initially celebrated as a medical miracle, and Dr. Kamrava the innovative pioneer behind the birth.  However, as details of Suleman’s life as a single mother living with her parents and receiving public assistance and that she had already had six other children via in-vitro fertilization, the larger repercussions of the octuplet “miracle” began to sink in.  The cost of raising eight babies was estimated to be over a million dollars in state and government funds, a bill  that would be coming largely from taxpayers’ dollars. 

Naturally, this caused an obvious drop in approval ratings for Octomom Suleman and the fertility doctor who had pioneered the embryo transfers.  Suleman became a symbol of the hazards of in vitro fertilization and also a tabloid sensation (not in the good way).  Dr. Kamrava was expelled from the American Society of Reproductive Medicine and went from being hailed as a pioneer of medicine to well, losing his job.

And what does the famed octomom Nadya Suleman have to say about all this?  We don’t really know yet, but some scantily-clad photos of her in a leopard print bikini were released earlier this week.  View them here .

Images by  caffeinatedlittlegirl and seb951 and Khaled El-Hage via Flickr and Wikimedia