27-yr-old pregnant woman treated on table, dies at Rajasthan hospital

Kota: A 27-year-old pregnant woman has died due to alleged medical negligence at a government hospital in Rajasthan's Bundi district, Congress Seva Dal district president Mahmood Ali said on Wednesday.

A resident of Bundi city's Gurunanak Colony, Koshaliya Bai, was admitted to the mother-child wing of the Bundi district hospital on Tuesday afternoon in full-term pregnancy, he said.

According to examination of Koshaliya Bai by two gynaecologists, she was expected to deliver the baby late at night or next morning and her condition was normal, he said.

The woman was not allotted a bed and was instead first treated on a table and then she moved to the gallery, where she lay unattended when she went into labour, Ali claimed, adding that the medical staff on duty declared the patient 'absconding' and said the staff of the last shift had not briefed them of her condition.

"Had the doctors on duty attended to my wife in time, she could have been saved. The staff on duty repeatedly said that we had left the hospital, while in fact we were outside in the gallery and were waiting for the treatment," the deceased's husband Nand Kishore said.

However, the hospital refuted the charges.

Principal medical officer (PMO) of the Bundi district hospital Dr O P Verma said the woman was admitted at 12:50 pm on Tuesday and was examined by the doctors but later she went absconding with her family and reappeared at 9 pm in a critical condition.

"The medical staff and hospital are not responsible for a patient who leaves the hospital ward without informing," he said.

He said the woman was attended by Dr BS Meena after she arrived at the hospital again.

When asked why a gynaecologist was not called in time to attend to Koshaliya Devi, Dr Verma said the hospital faced a staff crunch and there were only three gynaecologists and medical officers at the mother and child wing, against a requirement of five to eight doctors.

The hospital also does not have enough beds and space due to which doctors are forced to treat patients on tables outside the ward, the PMO said.

"When I examined the woman last night, there was no pulse or blood pressure in the body," Dr Meena said, adding that the woman most likely died due to fits during labour pain.

The medical officer on duty, Dr Meena, declared the woman dead at 9:25 am and handed over the body to family members at 10:35 am, Ali said.