Jeremiah Akinsetemi, a man, has accused the administration and medical staff of the Faith-Hills Specialty Hospital in Lagos State’s Egbeda neighborhood of negligence that led to the death of his wife, Rachael, who had given birth there.
Akinsetemi, a technical operator who works at a factory, saw his nine-month-pregnant wife writhing in labor when he got home from work on March 29, 2023, and he hurried her to a local hospital.
Akinsetemi told Newsmen, that while at the hospital, some doctors evaluated his wife’s health and admitted her to help with the delivery of the baby.
He said, “I met the doctor who directed us to the gynaecologist. We also met with the hospital’s MD who asked us to do a scan and the result indicated that she was 40 weeks plus some days and she was placed on observation in the hospital.
“Later on, they said my wife’s cervix was not open yet and that it has to be open for her to give birth. To soften her cervix, they inserted something inside her but her cervix did not open.
“But the gynaecologist, while assessing her condition, did some calculations and said she was just 40 weeks and told us not to allow the hospital to put pressure on us to do a Cesarean section and that some women give birth two weeks before or after.”
The grieving husband claimed that things changed when the hospital’s managing director informed him that his wife needed a surgical procedure for the benefit of the unborn child. He added that as a result of the gynecologist’s recommendation, he left the hospital and drove his wife to the Faith-Hills Specialist Hospital.
He said, “When we got there, they placed her on observation till the following day. In the morning, I returned home to do something when the MD of the hospital called to inform me that they would need to operate on my wife because her cervix was not opening despite being in labour.
“I discussed it with my wife, told her they are professionals and that since her cervix was not opening and she is feeling pains that deprived her of sleeping, I needed to sign the papers. I signed the papers and in less than 10 minutes, she delivered by herself without the surgery.
“I met them cleaning up the baby and also observed that my wife was bleeding and they were transfusing a pint of blood into her. But as I saw the rate at which the blood was flowing into my wife, I asked the nurse if that was the only pint of blood the hospital had and she said yes.”
Akinsetemi claimed that the doctors had already requested additional blood from the blood bank, and that when they were unable to do so, they alerted his neighbor and universal donor Rolint Ugele, who consented to provide blood for his wife.
He said, “But the hospital doesn’t have what they can use to collect the blood and screen it. Later on, they said the bleeding had stopped and that my wife was fine. I started informing people that she had given birth but suddenly, I saw the doctor and nurse rushing in and out and when I asked what happened again, they said the blood was gushing out again.
“The pint of blood they were giving her had finished and blood was rushing out. I complained and they said she would be fine and that they had called for an ambulance. When the ambulance came, we carried her into it as she was on oxygen. But before we got to Ayinke House in LASUTH, she stopped breathing.
“My wife gave birth around 10am, and after putting her corpse in the mortuary, I returned to the private hospital around 8pm for my newborn who was not given anything to eat other than the glucose. I took my baby away but before I left, I said if my wife did not give birth herself, they planned to operate her with only a pint of blood and with no ambulance on the ground, what would happen if there was an emergency?”
Dr. Lilian Obianuju, managing director of the Faith-Hills Specialist Hospital where Rachael gave birth, commented on the development by saying that Rachael had decreased fetal movement when she arrived at the facility. She continued by saying that despite being advised that a Caesarean Section was necessary to deliver the baby and save her life, the couple declined and left the facility on February 10.
She said, “They requested for discharge and we told them the implication of their action and she was discharged and we still gave her a one-week appointment to return for a follow-up but they never showed up until after eight weeks with a history of labour pain.
“When they returned, I was around that night and I told the husband that his wife needed to have an emergency CS done that night but he refused and told me that the hospital they came from gave them an option of CS and that he tore the consent form and brought the woman back here.
“He left that night, and in the morning, around 6am, we did a scan and the person that did the scan said the baby was not doing well. I had to call her husband to come and carry the wife if he would not consent to the CS. I have my evidence and in the process of trying to prepare for the CS, the woman delivered and whatever that happened from where she was coming from, I do not know and it is only the husband that can answer that.
“When the woman delivered, her blood was not clotting and I don’t know what they had done where she was coming from and we had to get blood urgently to transfuse her, placed her on oxygen and referred her to LASUTH and that was what happened.”
