Relative of dead man alleges GPHC neglect caused demise

May 01, 2011 News

Relatives of John Bhola, 36, of Tewkesbury, Leguan, East Bank Essequibo, who succumbed Thursday morning at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), are alleging that negligence and lack of proper care on behalf of the hospital staff contributed to the man’s demise.
According to Anjani Bhola, the dead man’s sister, who is an overseas-based Guyanese, after hearing of her brother suffering from a seizure and collapsing on the ground and injuring his head, immediately visited the Guyana to assist in any way possible.
Ms Bhola explained that she learnt after her brother received his injuries, he was taken to West Demerara Regional Hospital but was later transferred to GPHC on April 13, 2011 because they could not have dealt with his injuries.

The deceased John Bhola

Adding that her brother spent 16 days in the hospital, Ms Bhola said a surgery was done and a thoracostomy tube (the insertion of a tube to drain air, blood, bile, pus, or other fluids) was inserted into her brother’s throat while he was in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) to assist with his breathing.
“That tube required a lot of attention, the ventilator, and the patient is supposed to be constantly monitored and every time I go there I have to comment or complain about something.” Ms Bhola said.
The frustrated woman said that after spending about 12-days in the ICU her brother was transferred to the High Dependency Unit (HDU) where everything appeared to be going wrong.
“Every time I go there, I have to go tell the nurse that my brother needs suction to clear the fluid buildup in the tube…I think they did something wrong in the way they just left him there to punish and to die. Now my sister from Canada came in to see him and he already died.” Ms Bhola lamented.
After speaking to the doctor on a daily basis, Ms Bhola said the doctor did his job and there was improvement but the nurses were reckless in their duties. She also noted that in HDU her brother’s temperature was very high and she asked for permission to place a fan next to him since he was sweating a lot, but that was denied.
“Why do I have to mention these things to them, if I am not there everything goes wrong when I visit I have to tell them what I notice! What type of persons are working in the system?”
When GPHC’s CEO, Michael Khan was contacted he said that an investigation into the allegations has been launched, in addition to the postmortem results being available for Tuesday.