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“This piece is a hard one for me to write, hard and very difficult. As I write this, I am filled with deep sorrow for what could have been that was not. This piece is not intended to do anything but to warn unsuspecting members of the public. A warning that is necessary at this time because “evil deeds thrive when good men do nothing”
My discourse is centered on the level of mismanagement, inefficiency and a total lack of respect for life exhibited by management and staff of EKO Hospital on Mobolaji Bank Anthony Way, Ikeja.
My friend’s wife, Dolapo, a young mother of 2 boys, with a promising banking career with Wema bank, pregnant with the 3rd child had complained of leg pains to her husband on Tuesday, March 31, 2015. Her husband took her to the EKO Hospital for treatment (their registered HMO provider), they were told that the leg pains were normal for pregnant women at her stage and were subsequently given some paracetamol tablets to use.
Getting home, the pains did not subside, in fact, it grew worse. It got to a point that she could not walk with the legs on her own. The husband had no choice but to return to the hospital on Friday April 3, 2015 at around 3pm when it was obvious things were not getting better. At that point, The doctor on duty advised them to wait for the consultant and Dolapo was made to sit out the ‘’wait’’ in a wheelchair as her legs could no longer support and carry her, in any case the consultant did not show up until Saturday afternoon being 04/04/2015. She repeatedly beckoned on the staff on duty to perform a CS and safely get the baby out as she could sense and feel that something was ominously wrong. The pregnancy was well into 8 months. Some scan were recommended and the person to conduct the scan had reportedly closed for the day and only surfaced at about 9pm on Friday and the wait dragged well into the night.
Dolapo was in pains on the wheel chair, she was being moved from her ward to the scanning room when the head of the baby came out on the wheel chair, her husband screamed and rushed her quickly into the elevator, yes, ELEVATOR!!. The baby could not stand the trauma, he came out in transit, right there in the elevator. A nurse had to hold the baby’s head, supporting it while the elevator goes to labour theatre, the baby was pulled out before they could make it to the theatre. This was at 9.30pm on Friday. The baby became the centre of attention for the hospital staff of Duty while neglecting Dolapo all alone for more than 1 hr 30 mins while they attended to the baby to revive him.
She was left unattended to, in pains, right there in the theatre. She was eventually moved back to her ward. The consultant eventually turned up around 4pm on Saturday. The husband engaged him and he requested that some tests be done to ascertain what level of treatment or care to give. He was told she (the wife) would be fine and the test results would be ready by Tuesday because of the holidays.
On Sunday, April 5, 2015, at about 8am in the morning, I visited her in the hospital and sat beside her on the bed offering words of encouragements. She was still in pains, and she was hardly audible, she could only answer in nods and made attempts at a faint smile to reassure myself and her husband that she would be fine.
It came as a rude shock when I called the husband at about 12 pm and he was crying profusely, saying Dolapo is lying down lifeless and that I should please pray. I was to say the least devastated, I was asking loads and loads of questions and he kept saying please pray, pray.
I got to the hospital to meet the lifeless body on the bed, she was dead! What happened? How did this happen? Nobody could offer any explanation. There was no doctor around, I asked the nurse on duty and she just said she is dead. I recalled she was eating when I left earlier, how could she have gone from eating to being dead in less than 3 hrs?
The husband told me she was given an injection to suppress the pains on her leg and immediately started gasping for breath, oxygen tanks were brought in to revive her but it was too late. She was gone before anything could be done.
The body was left in the room for more than 24 hours, several prayer sessions were held to bring her back to life. In the more than 24 hrs period after her death, no doctor from EKO Hospital came out to say this was what happened. No personnel came around to ask people to leave the room, the body was not covered nor washed. It was simply business as usual for them.
It was normal for someone to give birth and die? The Medical Director of the hospital did not deem it fit to offer explanation or even try to prevail on the family to leave the body so that necessary medical procedures could be done.
I will leave my readers to ask questions from this write up, perhaps, I am being too expectant, maybe too optimistic about my expectations from a Hospital as reputable as EKO Hospital!
The family has accepted their fate and decided to move on…. But should we move on? Should we just accept this as normal? I was talking to a friend in my office yesterday and was shocked when he informed me that his wife also died in this same EKO Hospital some 6 years back and the same treatment was meted out on him!
Please pass this story around, let people know what is going on, don’t stop until it gets to the right quarters where something could be done to save others and get doctors and hospitals to be more responsive to their duties of saving lives and not taking lives. Dolapo is gone but who knows who will be next?????”
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