Maravi

Family threatens legal action against Ndola Central Hospital

Family threatens legal action against Ndola Central Hospital
By Sandra Lombe
Wednesday May 02, 2007 [12:07]

A 37-year-old Ndola woman has died after gloves and cotton wool were allegedly left inside her abdomen following an operation. Regina Mwape of Kabushi township died on Wednesday last week nine hours after she was operated on at Ndola Central Hospital. And Mwape's family has threatened to sue the hospital for negligence.

A relative of the deceased Paul Sunkutu said that Mwape was taken to the hospital on April 22, 2007 after she complained of suspected malaria and pain in the legs.

He said a malaria test on her came out negative.

"They did an operation on her on Tuesday at 14:00 hours and by 16:00 hours she was taken back to the day room ward instead of the sub acute ward. Around 17:00 hours she started complaining that she was feeling some movements in the abdomen," he narrated.

Sunkutu said Mwape later removed the plaster on one of the wounds that was not stitched.

He explained that a glove was seen protruding but people looking after her thought it was an intestine.

Sunkutu explained that relatives by her bedside then called the nurse on duty who told them to consult the personnel from the theatre section.

"Around 01:00 hours on Wednesday the poor soul died and the following day we went to the mortuary with people from Saint Anne to collect the body. On Friday when they (St Anne) were preparing the body, they discovered that she had two big wounds and a glove was protruding," Sunkutu said.

Sunkutu said he then rushed to Ndola Central Police to report the matter. He said the police retrieved the body from Saint Anne and took it back to Ndola Central Hospital for postmortem.

Sunkutu said during the post-mortem two more gloves and cotton wool were found.

"I have given instructions to our lawyers to take up the matter further," he said.

Both police and Ndola Central Hospital director clinical services Dr Charles Masase confirmed receiving the report.
Dr Masase said the action was justified.

"I learnt of the issue when relatives came to report the matter, they wanted post-mortem. The post-mortem was done in the presence of the family, consultant pathologists, consultant surgeon and myself. I can't go into details," he said

"We left them because the patient had abscesses (infection with puss inside) in the right side of the abdomen under the skin."
Dr Masase said the doctor who operated on Mwape opened the area to allow puss to come out.

"About a litre of puss came out. The doctor left the gloves to help in the drainage of puss hopefully that the patient would recover," he said.

"We explained to the relatives the reason the glove and cotton wool were left in the body. There was no negligence. The action was justified."

Labels: HEALTHCARE, NDOLA CENTRAL HOSPITAL

posted by MrK @ 6:30 PM