The Ondo State chapter of the National Association of Government General Medical and Dental Practitioners has condemned the assault of a doctor and nurse at the Mother and Child Hospital, Akure.
It was gathered that a yet-to-be-identified man, who was reacting to the death of his five-year-old son, attacked the medical workers on duty at the hospital on Saturday.
The man, while blaming the hospital staff for his loss, reportedly beat a doctor and nurse on duty with cutlass and chased other medics.
The man, whose action disrupted activities in the hospital, was said to have left angrily with the remains of his son.
The matter was reported at the ‘B’ Division Police Station, Akure.
According to a source, the man, alongside his wife, rushed their sick child into the emergency ward of the hospital.
The source said the minor was almost at a point of death when he was brought in.
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He said, “Immediately the man came in with the child, all the nurses on duty came to his rescue and the child was admitted and was put on life support. The father of the child was later told to pay the sum of N8,000 but unfortunately during that process the child gave up.
“When he was informed that the boy was dead, he angrily rushed into his car and brought out a cutlass which he used to beat a nurse and a doctor on duty. He was really mad. So everyone on duty had to run for safety.”
However, the Chairman of the medical association, Dr Makinde Olugbenga, faulted the bereaved father, while also denying allegations that the boy died due to negligence from the hospital.
He alleged that the attack on the medical practitioners was premeditated, against accusations that the hospital staff members were pressing phone.
The statement read, “It saddens our hearts to inform the general public of the unwarranted premeditated attack on hapless doctors on call duty at Mother and Child Hospital, Akure by a patient’s relative (father) of a chronically ill child rushed to the facility on the 24th day of March, 2023 at about 11:00PM.
“While the pediatrics call Doctor was in the Emergency ward attending to a patient, a five-year-old male child chronically ill looking was brought in by his parents. At the time of arrival in the hospital, the child’s condition has deteriorated and immediately the call doctors rushed to see the child leaving what she was doing since the condition looks more severe.
“The child was also noticed to be gasping. Upon arrival, the doctors immediately attended to the child and began resuscitative measures on him. Despite the assistance of another fellow senior doctor who until then was busy in the obstetrics and gynecology department, joining to assist her colleague by using her phone to illuminate the cannular site, the patient finally died.
“But to the great surprise of the doctors and other present in the hospital, the patient’s father stormed out of the ward and returned thereafter with a cutlass, moving from ward to ward and assaulting any doctors and nurses on sight, the other hospital personnel were not spared.
“In the process, the senior doctor who came to lend a helping hand was assaulted with a cutlass and sustained grievous bodily injury and she is currently undergoing treatment.”