Breakdown of medical care at hospital
This paper has learnt that a child, reported to have been diabetic, died in the waiting room at the Victoria Hospital casualty unit while waiting to be seen by a doctor. This comes after it was reported last year that a girl of tender age also died at Victoria hospital after she was given the wrong anesthetics before a simple ear operation. The tragedy casts serious and disturbing light on the state of medical care at our only hospital, which many feel is on the verge of total break down. Complaints of misdiagnosis by doctors and lack of adequate medical supplies have also been rife.
The latest incident follows recent disturbing “reports” from various parents of babies that, it is alleged, died or sustained severe brain damage during child birth attributed to medical negligence. This newspaper is aware of at least one baby which the mother alleged, suffered severe brain damage during delivery. The family has sought legal advice in order to sue the hospital authorities for negligence, we have been told.
The alleged diabetic baby who died in the waiting area of the casualty unit at Victoria hospital was sent there by the Anse Royal Hospital doctor as an emergency after she was taken there suffering from abdominal pain. The report did not say how the child was taken from Anse Royal Hospital at 9.00 pm, to the Victoria Hospital Casualty unit, whether in a private vehicle or an ambulance. However, the report also said that the victim died in the very early hours of the morning. If confirmed, it will mean that she had been unable to see a doctor for more than two hours.
It is not unusual for patients at the Victoria hospital’s casualty unit to wait quite a while before any doctor attends to them. This incident, however, underscores the breakdown in the health care system; in this case the accident and emergency units. As the patient had been referred by another medical facility, patients should not queue up at the casualty. It indicates that there is a either a breakdown of procedure or that there is no established procedure at all when dealing with emergency cases referred to by another establishment. One professional medical person has told this newspaper that the “triage” process is evidently not in operation at the casualty unit.
This newspaper has learnt of another case where a young girl was rushed to Victoria hospital after an acute attack of asthma. Although she was promptly placed under a nebuliser by the doctor in the casualty unit, it appears that she was left unattended for several hours, until a nurse discovered that the nebuliser was still being administered two hours after commencement. This prompted the nurse to contact the doctor who was at the time at home mowing his lawn, when he should have been in the casualty unit monitoring the patient.
The reported deterioration in the delivery of medical care at Victoria Hospital has been doing the rounds for sometime now. It now appears that the condition has taken a turn for the worse. A case of medical negligence against the Ministry of Health dating back to 1998 was recently the subject of the largest award for damages by the courts in Seychelles. It involved a young man who had gone for medical treatment for deep lacerations on his arm from a broken louvre blade only to end up losing his arm after it became infected and turned gangrenous. Several cases brought against the government for medical negligence have also been successful and the Courts are beginning to show more sympathy to victims of medical malpractice. There are also several cases pending before the Courts at present.
The Ministry of Health has had two Ministers in the space of one year.
