Doctors veto surgery, mother says
Medical personnel yesterday decided against removing the bullet lodged in the chest of the young woman who was shot by an ex-boyfriend on Tuesday night, telling her relatives that the surgery could leave her paralysed.
“This ain’t mek no sense,” Sophia Pitman said yesterday, her voice muffled by an oxygen mask, as she lay on a hospital bed with tears in her eyes.
Pitman, 22, of La Grange, West Bank Demerara, and the mother of a two-year-old, was shot in the right-side breast by an ex-boyfriend on Tuesday night while making her way from work to her mother’s Robb Street home. She is now a patient in the High Dependency Unit of the Georgetown Hospital.
Police yesterday said that no arrests have been made.
Her mother, Rosalyn John, told Stabroek News from her Robb Street home last night that after closely monitoring Sophia’s condition all day yesterday, doctors had told her that they would no longer be performing the operation to remove the bullet, which they had early said she had a fifty-fifty chance of surviving.
Pitman, who ended the relationship with her attacker some time back and moved on with someone else, could only manage a few words to relatives at the hospital yesterday. She was wearing an oxygen mask and there was a glass jar nearby, almost filled with fluid that had drained out of her body. Pitman was in distress, repeatedly shaking her head as she muttered words under her breath.
The worry over her daughter’s condition was evident on the face of John who had told this newspaper on the night of the incident that she was clueless as to what led to the attack. She was unaware of any grievances between Pitman and her ex-boyfriend, she said.
John said yesterday that what she has gathered was that two persons grabbed her daughter’s arms from behind, holding her still, while the suspect discharged a round, which hit her in the right-side breast.
This newspaper was told that the woman arrived at the hospital some 20 minutes after the incident in a terrible condition but doctors managed to stabilise her.
John said that earlier yesterday, the family was told by the nurses that the bullet was lodged in a bad place and if Pitman were taken to surgery she had a fifty-fifty chance of surviving. She said the nurses had advised them to get something for Pitman to eat and drink after which she would be observed.
John said Pitman had some food and drank some liquid but began crying out for pain. An injection was then administered to ease that discomfort.
It was much later yesterday, John said, that she was advised that a decision was made not to attempt to remove the bullet, since her daughter could be left paralyzed.
Meanwhile, she revealed that checks were made at the suspect’s North Road home, but he was not found. She said it is believed that he is hiding out in Linden.
In a statement, police said yesterday that they are investigating the shooting. According to police, the shooting occurred at 8 pm at the junction of Robb and Cummings streets, Bourda. Pitman was walking along the roadway when she was confronted by the man with whom she had recently ended a relationship. He pulled out a handgun and shot her to her right-side chest and escaped. Pitman was rushed to the hospital.