
MUHEED JEERAN
COLOMBO : Two weeks ago, few of my Facebook followers shared me an article regarding a 3 year old baby who lost his left kidney during the surgery to remove his damaged right kidney. I called the father of this baby to confirm the article circulated on social media, and he confirmed the details in the article.
Thereafter, I contacted the secretary to the Ministry of Health to get the contact information of Lady Ridgeway Hospital (LRH) Director Dr. Wijesooriya. Then I phoned the LRH director for a meetup in the evening, and he agreed to meet me on the same day, but I didn’t tell him that I wanted to talk to him regarding baby Hamdhi’s case. Before I met the director, I visited this baby’s ward, and I did not want to identify myself at the ward as a person to observe this case because I want to know what priority was given to this baby’s case in the hospital, as the article stated that the baby lost the kidney due to the surgeon’s negligence. So I want to know how hospital staff are aware of this unfortunate case and how much they are committing to supporting the family of this baby. Based on my observation by entering the ward, I found the attention paid to this case was in no way different to normal patients. I saw the unimaginable suffering of this baby personally and my heart was breaking. I was there with the baby for only 30 minutes, and I saw the boy stooling about five times. Whenever the baby was stooling, he alerted his father with signed language without opening his mouth, and then the father unwrapped the diapers and removed the soiled tissue, wiping with anothed tissue. Then he applies cream, keeps a new tissue, and wraps it with the same diapers. I asked how many times he went stooling, and he replied more than 40 times during that whole day, which is a real pain to hear about a small baby going through such a traumatic experience and suffering. The baby was not talking but making sign language, as his mouth is purely dried and wound inside the mouth. Only 300 ML of water should be given to the baby per day. It was very painful to watch and hear the suffering.
I heard from Hamdhi’s father that the doctors realised a mistake from their side and promised to recover the boy through a kidney transplant. Parents gave the benefit of the doubt to surgeons and put their faith in them without taking this matter to a higher authority or the public. But for many months, the commitment made by the medical professionals who made the blunder failed utterly, according to my observation from the parent’s side of the story. It was zero commitment from those surgeons.
Every profession needs ethics and empathy, but I don’t see the qualities from those surgeons after analysing a few incidents that the parents shared during my conversation with them. A donor’s ample was taken for Human leukocyte antigen (HLA) testing, but the report was delayed for months, so the priority was not given to Hamdhi by the hospital authority. The other matter, boy’s father, who is a labourer at a tyre shop, personally informed the consultant surgeon that the HLA testing at a private hospital cost Rs 60,000. The reply from the consultant surgeon, who is too accountable for this error, was pathetic and absolutely bonkers. He has told him I will find a donor for the cost, but he has never found a donor up until today. Where is the empathy from this surgeon, who has the ability to pay out of his own pocket. The surgeons who were accountable for this blunder never visited the child since this issue began at the end of December 2022, and at one occasion one of the surgeon visited another patient in the same ward, and hamdhi’s mother forcefully invited him to see her son’s fate. These surgeons’ inner feelings knew that a small error from their hands brought greater pain to a small baby, and they have a moral duty to comfort the pain to the baby’s parents through their actions of commitment, but these incidents are perfect enough to prove that they have totally betrayed the trust those parents had in these medical professionals. I told Hamdhi’s father that more than fighting for justice, we must save the baby’s life by putting more pressure on authorities, as they have a duty to prioritise.
However, I blamed the parents too for failing to highlight this matter to society at the early stage of this issue, but he said that they don’t know what to do and totally put their faith in the dictors who made this blunder. Sadly, these doctors betrayed them without putting more commitment into this case than any other. They could say transplant is not something that can be completed in days or months, but they must understand that even if you can’t reverse the error in days or may fail forever, your commitment is important to comfort the parents who gave birth to the child.
Thereafter, I met the LRH Director, Dr Wijesooriya at the ministry of health and had a discussion. He appointed a team to start an investigation, but he was explaining to me by drawing a diagram on a piece of paper about what went wrong during the surgery, and the surgeon thought it was a duplex kidney. Anyhow, I told him that there should be an impartial investigation and that it is the moral responsibility of the authorities to find out what really went wrong and what medical negligence was there. I also told him that giving more priority to this child’s medical attention is important here, which was lacking based on my observation from the information I received from Hamdhi’s father..
A few days later, I contacted Hamdhi’s father about the progress. He said that the HLA report has arrived now, which was delayed for months, but the child is in the intensive care unit. On 27th July 2023 i saw the news on social media that this poor little soul, Hamdhi ended his journey on this earth. Inna Illahi Wahina Illai Rajuhoon.
Today 30th July 2023 but still, the body of Hamdhi is not released, which is really surprising to me as this little boy has spent most of the time in LRH since December 2022.
I saw that the small article about the family’s appeal was not properly highlighted in the mainstream media except for a few web articles two weeks ago. Within 24 hours of that article, parents had received Rs 160 000 in their bank account. Unfortunately, after the demise of baby Hamdhi the mainstream media came to the scene to attack the medical system, which is a political issue in the public domain recent data, rather not the benefit of little Hamdhi’s lost life. The media must play a role in saving a life instead engaging in debating about the case in question after a damaged being done to this little soul.
I expect an impartial inquiry and justice for the parents of Hamdhi as these medical professionals failed in their commitment to reverse the blunder. (Muheed Jeeran
International Human Rights Activist)