Baron Munchausen and the Abused Child

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Abstract
Not even in the farthest reaches of his rich imagination could the great spinner of tall tales foresee that two centuries after his death his name would become eponymous. Nor did the physician, who first conferred the eponym on the wretched psychopath that beguiled him into performing unnecessary diagnostic and surgical procedures, suspect that the Munchausen effect could be exercised by proxy. Least of all did he expect that the proxy would be a child. In a recent communication, Meadow1reported two cases in which children became victims of parental Munchausen syndrome. One little girl underwent innumerable investigative, manipulative, anesthetic, radiologic, and surgical procedures during the six years of her life because her parents provided false information about her symptoms, tampered with her urine specimens, and otherwise interfered with observation by physicians and nurses. Another child, a 14-month-old toddler, died of hypernatremia after repeated hospital admissions for vomiting and

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