(Trinidad Guardian) As a single and independent mother, Katherine Akum Lum was living her best life. She loved her job as a building designer and project manager and was very successful. Akum Lum, at age 51, was providing a good and happy life for her son. She had also found love again after surviving domestic violence in her relationship. She was healthy and looking forward to a long and blissful life. But, her world came crashing down on June 12, 2019, when she went to the St James Medical Centre for a hysterectomy.
During the procedure, she said a doctor accidentally used lye to wash out inside her pelvic area instead of distilled water, causing extensive damage to her kidneys and abdominal wall. Lye, commonly used to clean drains and toilets, is a form of acid and is corrosive to the flesh.
Now, the clock is ticking and she needs to do an urgent ureteral reconstructive surgery costing US $116,000 which the North West Regional Health Authority (NWRHA) agreed to pay for. However, she claims the NWRHA is now stating that they may not be able to access the US currency by the date of her scheduled surgery–February 17–ripping apart the thin veil of hope she has been clinging to.
If the payments are not made by the end of this week, she may have to reschedule the surgery. As her tears flowed, she begged, “I am pleading and I am begging Mr Terrence Deyalsingh to please help me. Your incompetent institution has done this to me. Please, I need to live. If it wasn’t for the surgery I would have been normal and living a happy life.
“I am begging and pleading with you to help me to get my surgery. The surgery that North West has promised to do. How long will I live like this? Are they waiting for me to die so they don’t have to pay for my surgery? Because of them, I am in this position,” Akum Lum pleaded.
The NWRHA CEO, however, said they are making all required requests to the Authority’s bankers to facilitate payments. (See below)
Just a shell of the woman she used to be, Akum Lum, who weighs under 90 pounds, now spends most of her days in chronic pain on her bed praying that her nightmare will end. After being bedridden for two years, she can only now walk short distances, but very slowly as every step is painful.
During an interview with the Sunday Guardian at her Chaguanas home, Akum Lum, who was propped up by pillows on her bed, said her bedroom has now become her prison.
Several times during the interview she broke down in tears and repeatedly rubbed her abdomen complaining of pain, and there were times when she had to take a few seconds to compose herself as she took sips of water.
Showing the two urine bags attached to the tubes inserted in her kidneys through her back, she cried, “How long again can I live like this?” Recalling when her life began to crumble, she said she went to the doctor because she was not feeling well and was told she had an ovarian cyst. On her doctor’s advice, she decided to do a hysterectomy because they were concerned that it was cancerous.
“I was petrified because it was my first time doing surgery. I have always used the private sector to do everything. But, a relative of mine who is a doctor told me to go to St James Medical because they are best to do this surgery because we don’t know if it is cancerous or not, so I decided to take her advice because I know she would give me the best advice.”
The surgery was scheduled for June 12, 2019. “I was petrified. I said my prayers and I went in to do my surgery. When I woke up the following day the doctor had told me that something happened to me. I could not understand because when I came out my feet were swollen, my face was swollen. I could barely talk. I was really, really sick. I was feeling so horrible I thought it was because of the surgery, but then the doctor said to me that they sprayed a caustic wash, but I could not understand what was a caustic wash because I am no doctor.”
Recalling the horror she experienced, she said she spent two weeks in hospital. “In that two weeks, I was wearing pampers. After I came out of the surgery I was passing black stool uncontrollably. I was wondering God what is this? What is happening to me?” Akum Lum also had no control of her urine and was just “leaking like a pipe.”
While she walked into the hospital to do her surgery, she had to be wheeled out of the hospital in a wheelchair and in pampers to go home. “I came home really, really sick. I did not know what was going on.” She depended on her son, then nine years old, and her companion, Reynold Ramkissoon, to take care of her.
Akum Lum said she felt helpless, depressed, embarrassed and confused about what was happening to her. “They raped me of my independence. It isn’t easy to be a healthy normal woman and the next day when you wake up you suffering from this disability and you need someone. I am always strong and I do everything for myself, now I need help. I need someone to take me if I have to go anywhere.”
‘Only when lawyers stepped in I got answers’
She went back to the St James facility two months later hoping to find out what liquid was used in her body, but an official told her the liquid was not sufficient to go for testing. Akum Lum said she asked if she could get a sample to take for private testing abroad but got no reply.
“Is only when my lawyers stepped in then I knew what they had sprayed inside of me–liquid lye. Lye is what they use to clean the concrete and the moss and drain. Can anyone really tell me what liquid lye was doing in the operating theatre?”
Akum Lum’s worst fears came to reality as she learnt details of the horror that was perpetrated against her and the extent of the injuries which are detrimental to her body and her life.
Akum Lum said she was told it would take 90 minutes to do the hysterectomy. Instead, she said, the procedure took nine hours during which pieces of her small and large intestines had to be cut out.
“The part of my intestine that absorbs B12 was cut out so I have to take B12 (supplements) for the rest of my life.”
Akum Lum later underwent a procedure to put nephrostomy tubes because her two ureters, the ducts that connect to the bladder and kidney, were also damaged. “Presently, I have two nephrostomy tubes. I have a third one that is lodged inside my kidney, the stent implant, they were unable to take it out in the procedure which I did in March.
“They discovered because of what is happening with me I now have a large kidney stone, hence the reason I have to get the surgery done because it could cause renal failure because it is both kidneys. I can live with one kidney but I have both kidneys in danger, they are swollen. I also have a vagina fistula and inside of my abdominal area, the lining is also damaged.”
She said every day her tubes are flushed out and they are supposed to be changed every six months, but it costs $30,000 to replace the tubes. Akum Lum explained that her tubes become blocked and infected frequently. “I am in a lot of pain, my stomach hurts, my back hurts, my head hurts. I am just tired. I am really, really tired.”
Akum Lum initiated legal proceedings through Freedom Law Chambers which is still pending. However, she said the NWRHA agreed to pay the cost for reconstructive surgery to be done at the Urology of Virginia, Sentara Norfolk Hospital because her case is unique and cannot be treated locally. Pointing to her two suitcases in her bedroom, Akum Lum said the surgery was already booked and they are supposed to leave for the United States on Saturday.
“Now they give me this false hope that I will go and do this surgery. It is just a set of promises and promises from this institution. They promise to send me abroad to do reconstructive surgery because there is no one else to do it here. It is the first time that someone’s inside was sprayed with lye. As the time is approaching, now they are saying they don’t have the funds but they can find the money for Carnival, the $20 million and they cannot give me the money to do my surgery. That is a heartless and reckless institution. Without the surgery, I can die.”
Akum Lum, sobbing as she recounted her experience, said “The nurses and they kept asking me if I was a Venezuelan, that was when they had the big issue with the Venezuelans and the work permits.”
Akum Lum admitted that she had contemplated ending her life. But, she said her faith was what has kept her going as well as support from her companion. She has also gotten support from attorney Anand Ramlogan and her other lawyers, family and friends.
“I am depressed. I have to live with two bags. I cannot walk. I cannot function. I cannot do anything. I cannot eat. I cannot sleep. I just want to be normal again.”
But, Akum Lum knows that she may never lead a normal life again, but she is hoping that after the surgery she could lead a painless and tubeless life and return to some semblance of normalcy.
Akum Lum started building her own five-bedroom home, but never got a chance to complete it. She was hoping to marry her companion, travel the world with him and her son and provide the best education for her son.
Instead, she said her son is traumatised and lives in fear that she may die, while her relationship with her companion is in jeopardy. She has depleted all her savings as she pays someone to clean her tubes and another person to prepare their meals.
Chastising the NWRHA, she said, “They did this to me. But up to today, they have not apologised to me to say that I am sorry. I thank God I am alive to tell my story. This is a nightmare, it is like a horror story.”
