By Lakhram Bhagirat
A first-time mother has accused the nursing staff at the Georgetown Public Hospital’s (GPHC) Maternity Ward of grievous mistreatment during and after her child’s birth on Monday last.
Jennifer Jagdeo of Herstelling, East Bank Demerara, said she is still traumatised at the treatment meted out to her at the GPHC during her admission to deliver her child. The 36-year-old woman told Guyana Times International on Saturday that after experiencing intense pain on Monday, she visited her doctor to have a check-up but her doctor had an emergency resulting in her being referred to the GPHC.
The woman, who was seven months pregnant at the time, explained that she was forced to wait for a long period of time before she was attended to at the medical facility.
“One nurse pass me and she ask me if I getting pain and I said yes. She said that you ever make babies before, you know what pain feel like and I said no this is my first baby and when I tell her that she said alright let me take you,” she said.
“To see (if I was ready), she said you know what, you gotta run. So she hold my hands pulling me to run with that condition I was in and when I reached to the end of the wall, all I do was I brace the wall and I feel like all my life coming out and I was going on the floor,” Jagdeo added.
She further explained that after the humiliating experience, the entire staff and patients in the Maternity Ward began laughing at her, after which she was picked up and placed on a bed to be checked. Tearfully relating her experience, said that she was then checked to determine whether she was fully dilated. She said that having realised that she was fully dilated, the nurses wheeled her into the delivery room. The grieving woman related that throughout her pregnancy, she experienced complications.
“The baby was in a breached position and I tell them that I need a C-section because my doctor had already told me to tell them that I will have to get a C-section and I tell them,” she recounted.
“One of the midwife say why I can’t push out the baby on my own and then afterwards they wanted that but then she said okay signup the form for the C-section and when I sign up now, them tell me that somebody was in the (operation) theatre and I’d have to wait. They were leaving (the delivery room) and I feel the baby sliding out. Them (the nurses) tell me that don’t push and I wasn’t pushing but I feel the baby sliding and when they done walk out the room, one of them turn around and she see the baby coming,” Jagdeo added.
Jagdeo said that because of her complication, she was told that there is a strong possibility that her baby girl would not survive. However, she said that due to the treatment meted out to her, she feels that the nurses contributed to her baby dying.
“When I come out labour room, the doctor came and they tell me because during the pregnancy, I had some complication and they told me that my baby won’t make it. They have the baby in the incubator and they just pumping some air, so when the doctor finish, they said the baby won’t make it and I said okay,” the woman explained.
“I was bleeding a lot. I sit down and the doctor come and give me the baby to hold… I want to share that moment with my husband seeing that my baby already passed away,” she added.
Jagdeo is calling on the management of the hospital to ensure that their nurses are trained to deal with patients professionally and with some amount of humanity. The family has since indicated that they intend to lodge an official complaint with the GPHC and then have an independent examination of Jagdeo, who is still unable to walk and is bleeding.
“I felt like worst than dog treatment at the Georgetown Public Hospital. I never wanted to go there, my husband and I we planned to go to private but after the situation came up with the doctor, so come he end up to tell them put me over there (at the GPHC),” she related.
The funeral for Jagdeo’s baby was held on Wednesday, the day after she was discharged from hospital.
