Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (UM)
Udupi, Nov 28: A pregnant woman lost her baby in the womb allegedly due to negligence of the staff at the government hospital for women and children here on Saturday November 28.
Sumathi (30), wife of Ganesh, a resident of Palli, was seven months pregnant. On Saturday morning, she was told by the hospital that her baby had died in the womb.
It is said that Sumathi had been coming to the same hospital for the past seven months for checkup. On Thursday November 27 she came to the hospital again in the morning and was asked to wait.
Sumathi was reportedly made to sit in the waiting room all day, until around 5 pm, after which, due to constraint of space, a bed was put for her in a passage and she was admitted.
On Saturday morning, she was taken for scanning, after which it was revealed that her baby had died in the womb.
The baby was supposed to be the couple's first child after more than three years of marriage.
Soon after the unborn baby's death came to light, the family members gathered at the hospital and alleged that negligence had led to the death.
The hospital is usually overcrowded with patients and does not have enough facilities to accomodate them. When there is shortage of space, beds are put up for patients in the passage way, it is alleged.
The family members approached the town police station to file a complaint, but they were told to first lodge a complaint with the district surgeon and the health department, which they did.
Speaking to daijiworld, district surgeon Mahendra dismissed allegations of negligence by the hospital and said that the reason for the baby's death was unclear. "The lady was 28 weeks pregnant and if she had delivered, chances of survival of the baby would have been slim. She developed labour pain in the middle of the night and as we have no scanning machine in the hospital, she was sent to a private scanning centre. The report from private scanning centres is usually delayed, and in this case also it was so. However, the report showed that both the mother and baby were healthy.
"This morning when the doctor checked her, he found that the baby was still. Only then we came to know that it had died. However, there was no problem with either the baby or the mother, so the cause for death in unclear. But there has been no negligence in the hospital. We had even suggested the family to take her to Lady Goschen hospital in Mangaluru but they chose to stay here. If we had a scanning machine here, maybe this would not have happened," he added.