Opinion ID: 1160174
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Medical Attention

Text: The superior court also concluded that T.R. had knowingly failed to provide the medical treatment the children needed. Although T.R. lists actions she took, medical and otherwise, to care for her sons, the relevant concern under AS 47.10.010(a)(2)(B) is whether the children were in need of treatment that T.R. knowingly failed to provide. No party is claiming that T.R. always failed to care for her sons, only that there were enough instances of such failures to raise questions concerning her fitness as a parent. Subsection (B) speaks to physical and emotional neglect. There is abundant evidence in the record of both. T.W.R had cradle cap and a rash over his whole body. J.P.M. was anemic. He had emotional problems as well, being diagnosed as suffering from emotional dwarfism, a non-organic form of failure to thrive. Doctors worried that all of T.R.'s children might be failing to thrive. [5] Yet they all made rapid gains after being taken from T.R.'s care and placed in foster homes. In addition to the physical neglect discussed above, Dr. Bergeson found a rectal fissure and suspected sexual abuse of P.S.R., though he could not be certain. T.R. also states that Dr. Andreassen, the primary care physician for the boys, never had any concern that the mother was neglecting or abusing her sons. However, it was not erroneous for the superior court to attach more weight to the testimony of the witnesses who described the signs of neglect  and later improvement  that they observed. [A]ssessing witness credibility is a trial-court function and a superior court which credits one version over another is acting within its discretion. Hanlon v. Hanlon, 871 P.2d 229, 232 (Alaska 1994); Parker v. Northern Mixing Co., 756 P.2d 881, 892 (Alaska 1988).