Court records have revealed how Tsabong Hospital staff falsified records in a case in which an asthma patient allegedly died due to gross negligence.
This emerged in a case in which a Tsabong family filed a P6 ,040, 000 gross negligence and medical malpractice lawsuit against the Attorney General, after Tsabong Hospital Chief Medical Officer, Dr Amani Mrindoko admitted that “ things could have been done better” in relation to the death of their mother, 57 year old Rancy Chijoro who died after suspected asthmatic attack.
The family’s lawyer Ookeditse Maphwakwane revealed in court papers that careful perusal of medical records shows that there was negligence by staff who were attending Chijoro. Among other things, said Maphakwane, the nurses checked Chijoro’s blood sugar only twice instead of every two hours as instructed by the doctor.
It further emerged that the hospital staff may have doctored Chijoro’s records because her drug sheet indicate that she was administered medication at midday on the day she was admitted to hospital, although records show that at the time she was already deceased.
Maphakwane argued that Chijoro was not adequately investigated and managed since the definitive cause of her illness and death remains unknown. Though a diagnosis of coma was made, it was not adequately investigated.
It has also emerged that medical checks such as urine dipsticks were not done to rule out ketenes in the urine. Said Maphakwane, ‘reasonable investigations should have included amongst other things arterial blood gas, full blood count and liver function.’
According to the court papers the patient’s condition required that she be referred to Princess Marina Hospital urgently for computed tomography of the brain, but this was not done. Maphakwane further said it was “shocking to discover that a patient of her condition which required high level of care was not referred to Princess Marina and that basic diagnostic investigations were not done on her to avert an unnecessary and untimely death as it has occurred.”