HYDERABAD: For the second time this month, a child died at Niloufer Hospital here, allegedly due to medical negligence. The parents of an infant suffering from neo-natal asphyxiation said their child died on Sunday, within hours of being admitted, as staff didn’t immediately attend to the baby. A doctor from the hospital, however, refuted these claims, saying the child had only a 1-2 per cent chance of survival.On April 9, a 12-year-old, who sustained an injury to his stomach, died due to alleged negligence of the doctors.
The parents of the infant, who hail from Kamareddy, blamed the doctors and nursing staff at Niloufer Hospital, saying their child died due to improper treatment and negligence.The father, Balaiah, claimed that though his child had difficulty in breathing, the doctors didn’t do anything. While the mother said: “The doctor and the nurse asked me to go out and wait while they attend to my child. I did not go, and saw the doctor and nurse leave her unattended. I fought my way back to my child though the staff tried to prevent me. The nurse then calmly told me that the infant had died. They...allowed her to die.”
However, Dr Ravi Varma, head of the pediatrics dept, refuted the claims and said, “The newborn was suffering from stage-three neo-natal asphyxiation, with 1-2 per cent survival chances. This happens because the flow of oxygen to the brain is cut off. The only action we take in such a situation is to provide oxygen to the child. Stages one or two have a chance of survival”
He added, “The bloody puncture holes on the child’s body were due to IV administered at multiple hospitals before she was brought to Niloufer. The parents took the child to a government hospital in Nizamabad, then to private hospitals where IV drips were administered multiple times.”
Dr Varma further said that the hospital was acutely short-staffed, and had only 150 nurses, when 450 were required. “The hospital is currently capable of catering to only 10 per cent of tertiary care services. Yet most of the cases we cater to are tertiary cases.”