Passenger who fell died of brain haemorrhage –post-mortem

A post-mortem examination performed on the passenger who fell as he was boarding a Caribbean Airlines flight bound for New York on Saturday showed that he died from cerebral haemorrhage and a fractured skull.

Dhanchand Balkishun

Dhanchand Balkishun, 57, an American resident of Bush Lot Village, West Coast Berbice succumbed to his injuries on Sunday morning at the Georgetown Public Hospital.

A Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scan was done of his brain on Sunday morning, while he was in an unconscious state and it had also revealed that he had sustained a fractured skull and haemorrhaging.

His wife Akleema Balkishun, 53, told Stabroek News that the pathologist, Dr. Nehaul Singh also told her that her husband suffered a severe blow to his head and that he was “surprised that he lived so long.”

He was at first taken to the Diamond Diagnostic Centre on the East Bank of Demerara about two hours after the fall where an injection for pain was administered and he was sent home.

However, half an hour after arriving home, Akleema noticed that her husband appeared delirious and she rushed him to the Mahaicony Hospital where it was suspected that something was wrong with his brain.

He was immediately transferred to the Georgetown Public Hospital and was admitted a patient. The following morning, while in an unconscious state, he was referred to have the MRI done.

In a release, the airport corporation had stated that, “Airport employees in the immediate vicinity, some of whom are trained first responders, reacted quickly and professionally to the incident by placing the passenger on a stretcher and transporting him by vehicle to the nearby GDF Base Camp Stephenson’s Medical Facility.”

It said too that he regained consciousness at the facility.