“Management has launch-ed a full investigation into the circumstances surrounding the infant’s death and will update the media in a subsequent release,” a statement from the GPHC said yesterday. “GPHC wishes to state that no death is acceptable and extends sincere condolences to the family and relatives of the deceased,” it added.
However, Kinsha Gillis, the mother of Jaheim Niles, last evening told Stabroek News that she and her family are yet to hear from management of the hospital on the death. They have “not heard a single word” from hospital officials, she said.
Gillis, 19, of 4643 Rasville, Roxanne Burnham Drive, Georgetown had told Stabroek News on Monday that her seven-month-old son received treatment after waiting first for four hours on Sunday at the facility and “more hours” when he was once again rushed there on Monday.
Gillis said when she first took the child to the hospital, he did not receive prompt medical although he began wheezing as he struggled to breathe. Gillis said that he was prescribed an antibiotic after it was determined that he had a cold and an inflamed lung. He was also given oxygen and seemed to have recovered only to suffer a similar asthma attack again in the wee hours of Monday morning.
He was rushed to nearby East La Penitence Health Centre, where the nurse-on-duty referred him to the GPHC. When they arrived at the hospital and presented the slip, they were told “take a seat and wait your turn.”
The young mother noted that doctors administered oxygen and told her to wait outside. She, however, kept making periodic checks and observed that the child’s condition worsened after an injection was administered. She left the room and when she returned she was shocked that the child had already died; his body had been wrapped. That was shortly after noon yesterday.
Gillis said she was not allowed to identify the body, nor was she told that the child would be taken to the morgue. She called her mother and other relatives but by the time they rushed to the hospital, the baby was already in the morgue.
A friend of the family, who works at the hospital morgue, informed the family that an autopsy will be performed on the child’s body today, this newspaper was told. The family was last night supporting the young woman as she prepares to witness the autopsy of her only child.
