The Georgetown Public Hospital says it will “employ every effort” to bring to justice relatives of a patient who become abusive to staff. This statement was issued following the abuse of staff last Friday.
The incident arose from the death of an 18-year-old patient who was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation, a heart condition, a release from the Public Relations Office of the hospital said. On Friday the young man was rushed to the hospital and was subsequently admitted to the High Dependency Unit.
According to the release, “his medical history revealed that he was a cardiac patient who had undergone surgery, but the relatives could not explain for what reason”. He was rushed to the hospital “as a result of him experiencing palpitations of the heart, chest pain and irregular heartbeat”.
The release stated further that around 3 pm on Friday “the patient began gasping for breath and was treated accordingly”. When the visiting hour came around (4pm), the young man’s situation continued to deteriorate and two visitors at a time were allowed at his bedside.
But relatives did not heed the two at a time rule “and it was at this point that the abuse of the staff commenced” the release said. The release added that “more relatives barged into the ward and advanced to the patient’s bedside”.
Requests for relatives to leave the ward “to allow the staff to employ resuscitation efforts” were ignored, the release added. “They remained on the ward until the patient’s body was wrapped and removed; for they could not be controlled by the hospital’s Public Safety Officers; to whom threats and derogatory remarks were also hurled”.
The hospital called these outbursts by relatives “distasteful, dangerous and illegal”.
Meanwhile, the release implored media operatives “to be more responsible” in their duties. According to the release when the relatives stormed the HDU ward a reporter was on their trail filming the occurrence. The hospital called the action by the media operative, who it did not name, “irresponsible and a breach of hospital’s protocol”.
