Hours after a stillbirth delivery, a 31-year-old Corentyne mother of three succumbed in the wee hours of yesterday morning, plunging her family into grief and prompting claims of negligence against staff of the New Amsterdam Public Hospital.
Vanessa Sahadeo, also known as ‘Venny’, 31, was admitted to the hospital last Monday to deliver her fourth child.
But by Friday, she had delivered the stillborn baby and was then forced to endure an hours-long wait for an ambulance to transport her to the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPH), where she would eventually die herself.
Sunday Stabroek made multiple attempts to contact Vishalya Sharma, Director of Regional Health Services yesterday but several calls to her phone were declined on the first ring. Further calls to her were also not answer-ed.
The Ministry of Health subsequently announced that it has launched an investigation into the circumstances surrounding Sahadeo’s death. In a brief statement, the ministry extended condolences to Sahadeo’s relatives and assured them that the circumstances that led to her death would be “investigated thoroughly.”
At Sahadeo’s home, where she lived with her parents and other relatives, the atmosphere was one of sadness, confusion and anger yesterday. Relatives, many of whom were in a state of disbelief, tried to console each other. Sahadeo’s parents were still awaiting an explanation from medical officials.
Her mother, Claris Cecil, 53, of Williams-burgh, Corentyne, explain-ed that her daughter was admitted on Monday as that marked the completion of the full nine-month term of her pregnancy.
“She strong and everything,” Cecil recounted. “Every day abbay a go see she, she a walk strong and me a laugh she how strong she a walk and she a make joke and she a talk good good”.
However, she did note that her daughter was experiencing a blood pressure issue, for which she had been prescribed medication.
Sahadeo contacted Cecil via cellphone on Friday morning and informed her that she would be taken to the labour room to deliver her baby. Before going, Sahadeo asked her mother to prepare the bed at home. The young woman was expecting to celebrate her 32nd birthday on March 8th, and a nine-day celebration for the baby on March 9th.
But everything came to a halt when Cecil received another phone call just before lunch on Friday from someone who identified themself to be a nurse at the New Amsterdam. The caller informed her that Sahadeo has delivered but that the baby was dead and that they had to remove the woman’s womb. Cecil was also told that that her daughter would have to be transferred to the GPH.
Cecil and her husband then rushed to the New Amsterdam hospital and after going to see Sahadeo she said she initially thought her daughter was dead.
According to the woman, after her husband burst in tears and started to scream, they were approached by a nurse who then informed them that Sahadeo was alive and being prepared to be transferred to the GPH.
Also at that stage, Cecil recalled that the nurse told them that their daughter needed blood.
Despite the severity of her situation, Sahadeo could not be transferred immediately to the GPH as the ambulance was already en route to GPH with another patient. “So them got to wait ’til the ambulance come back from Georgetown and then carry me daughter. And abbay been deh ’til after 5 (pm) coming on to 6 (pm) then the ambulance come,” the woman recounted.
Sahadeo’s parents were then informed that no relative could go with her in the ambulance and so they were forced to alert relatives in Georgetown to go over to the hospital and await their arrival as they were planning to travel down.
Sahadeo’s uncle, Joseph Lewis, then explained, that when his niece arrived at GPH a team of doctors took over “and they start to administer blood and oxygen to her and the word from one of the doctors there was that she [Sahadeo] was actually more than 90% wasted”.
He said they rushed her to a theatre and after a few hours he was called in to speak with the lead consultant. “He said that when she was admitted [at New Amsterdam Hospital], based on her chart, her pressure was high and her pressure keep going up and he didn’t see no medication administer to stabilise that pressure and because of that now, it caused two things; they ruptured a vein in her brain and it ruptured the tube attaching the baby to the mother womb,” the man related.
According to Lewis, he was told that the ruptures triggered a “bleeding”. “And at the eleventh hour they decided to do a C Section. The C Section now increased the bleeding, the baby was already dead and they decided to save the mother and they removed the womb and that didn’t help because fluid started to flood the chamber and the bleeding increasing. So they pad it up, crimp it, put a tube in her to drain her, ventilate her and ship her to George-town like a butchered cow,” the upset uncle said.
Lewis further noted that he was told by the doctor at GPH that they would have to wait 24 hours to see whether Sahadeo would stabilise. “They can’t do no intervention because if they did an intervention she would not survive so they put her on the necessary machine and they were taking her to ICU but a few minutes after she started to [flat] line, so they let her remain in the theatre for further observation and tried to stabilise her.”
This newspaper was told that Sahadeo was eventually taken to the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit, where she succumbed just before 3 am yesterday.
Lewis noted that the staff at GPH was extremely professional. “They must be commended and they treated us like human beings. We can’t say the same for the New Amsterdam Hospital,” he stressed.
The man bemoaned the treatment the family received at New Amster-dam, while saying that they were made to feel like they should not be at the hospital. “They treat you with arrogance and total disrespect,” he charged, while adding that something needs to be done.
Lewis said his family will be looking at taking legal actions against the hospital. He mentioned that they were informed that a post-mortem examination will be done early this week, but that they are also looking to see if they can have their own private autopsies carried out.
Sahadeo is survived by her three daughters, who are ages 11, 9 and 6.
