Treatment at the Accident and Emergency (A&E) Unit of the Georgetown Public Hospital stalled yesterday as for more than an hour there was no medical personnel on duty.
A number of persons, including a man who was bleeding from the head and a child who was vomiting blood were forced to endure added discomfort as a result of the situation.
Contacted yesterday afternoon Director of Medical Services at the institution Dr Madan Rambarran said he was not aware of any such situation.
However, when this newspaper visited the hospital yesterday afternoon, patients who said they had been waiting long hours for attention, said they had been told that no doctor was on duty and were asked to bear with the hospital.
A man whose ten-year-old daughter fell from a verandah earlier in the day, said the child was vomiting blood. He said he arrived at the institution and was waiting with his ailing child for about an hour and a quarter and eventually the child was taken into the room.
The man said he was told that high emergency cases were being given preference, particularly life and death situations. He said he was told that at the shift change, the doctors scheduled to work had apparently not arrived, so a matron from another section of the institution had gone across to the A&E Unit and was helping to appease patients.
When this newspaper left the hospital around 4:30 yesterday afternoon the man was still waiting to hear about his daughter’s condition.
Another man waiting to be seen, told this newspaper he was hit by another man with two glass bottles in two separate parts of his head; he was bleeding during his interview.
“I have been here since one o’clock and all I hearing is that they hardly got doctors in there and up to now my name hasn’t been called cause now I heard they ain’t got no doctor at all now,” the man said, around 4.30 pm yesterday.
The man, who said he was 63 years old and was trying his best to deal with the pain he was feeling, said he was contemplating going to a drugstore to purchase antibiotics to prevent any infection, clean his wound and go home.
Another person waiting was a mother, whose son was struck down by a car. The child was transferred to the GPH from the Diamond Diagnostic Centre. The woman said while her son had completed x-rays at Diamond, which proved he had no broken bones, he continued to vomit excessively and complained about headaches and had to be transferred. They arrived at the GPH only to be asked to wait since there was hardy any medical personnel on duty.
She said she had been waiting for close to three hours and it was after some persons started to voice their concerns, that her son as well as two other children was taken into the emergency room and placed on beds.
“But when I went in there, no one was there tending to them, so we waiting to see what will happen,” the woman said.
A source informed this newspaper that the early shift had the regular complement of doctors working but the amount had lessened at around 1pm when some doctors and nurses left. They were not relieved. The source said at least two doctors and two nurses had remained, but later on there was only one of each.
“But for about an hour and a half close to two hours there was no doctor or nurse because at about close to four no one was here and the children who were awaiting attention were taken in by a matron and placed on beds as they awaited the doctors’ arrival,” the source said.
On a regular day the full contingent of medical personnel at A&E is four doctors and sometimes as many as four nurses, this newspaper was told.
Rambarran told Stabroek News that he was not aware that only one doctor and one nurse were working at any one time.
“As far as I know the full complement of staff is working and we do the same system where patients are seen based on the level of emergency,” he said.
Told about the man whose head was bleeding and how had waited for hours, he said he would need the man’s name so that he could follow-up on the matter. “If you can’t give me the man’s name then I can’t follow up on the matter, because I need to know the specific case and if I don’t have details I can’t provide any explanation,” he said.
This newspaper was reliably informed that two doctors arrived later in afternoon and by 6 pm three doctors and nurses were on duty.
