[dropcap]A[/dropcap] 31-year-old nurse, Mrs. Faith Obinna has accused doctors at St. Raphael Divine Mercy Hospital in Ikorodu, Lagos State, of stealing her new born baby shortly after she delivered.
In an interview with NewTelegraph, Mrs. Obinna said she used St. Raphael Divine Mercy Hospital, a Catholic hospital for her pre-natal care and that during her appointments with the doctor, three scans were conducted which showed that she was carrying twins.
However, when she had her baby at the same hospital, the doctors presented only 1 baby to her. She claims her baby was stolen in the labour room of the hospital before she could recover from anaesthesia. She is accusing the doctors of being responsible for the theft of her baby.
The new mother insisted that she delivered twins and that one of them was stolen in the labour room of the hospital before she could recover from anaesthesia. She was given anaesthesia before a Caesarean Section (CS) was carried out on her. She claims that the anaesthesia was given to her even after she had told doctors at the hospital that she didn’t want it.
She further explained that after registering at the hospital, she was asked to carry out three scans and each showed that she was carrying two babies. She said that even the heartbeats of the two babies were different and that the laboratory technician showed her the babies on the screen of the scan machine. The scan also showed that one of the babies was a boy, but the sex of the other couldn’t be determined at the time because its leg covered the sex organ.
Mrs. Obinna said: “On the first day I registered at the hospital, one doctor Ade that attended to me, asked me to go for a scan. The scan showed twins. The pregnancy was then four months. The second scan was to determine the sex of the babies. One was a boy, but the technician couldn’t tell the sex of the other baby because its leg covered the organ part. I was later handed over to doctor Uzoma, who took care of me until delivery.”
She explained that in the process of subsequent ante-natal visits, Dr. Uzoma asked her to do another scan, which she did. The doctor said everything was fine. Mrs. Obinna said that before the delivery day, she did three scans in total and they all showed the twins in different foetal positions.
She said: “On the day of the delivery, they tried to send my husband away, but he refused to go home. He went out to wait. After the operation, they called my husband and told him that it was only one baby inside my womb. Even though I was feeling groggy, I only heard the cries of one baby. I asked my husband, where is the other baby, the staff asked me to calm down. Four days later, my husband and I decided to raise the alarm. The chief medical doctor of the hospital asked me to accept just one baby, I refused.”
After she was discharged, Faith and her husband refused to pay the balance of their medical bills, unless the different scans were given to them.
She said: “When I was about to be discharged, I asked for my scan results, they refused to give them to me. Rather, they hid my file. When we wanted to leave, they locked the gate against us.”
When the couple was eventually allowed to go, they narrated the incident to friends and family members and returned to the hospital. The hospital, which is a Catholic health facility, invited a reverend father and sister and senior doctors.
She said: “We asked for the scan result. They said that if they released the results, they wouldn’t like to see it on social media that it could affect the medical doctor and the hospital could be shut down. He said that what happened was scan error. I told them it was impossible. I know that scan error could occur in sex, but not where twins’ detection is concerned. I saw the babies with my two eyes. I know they are with one of my babies. The reverend asked us to have mercy. He promised to refund all money we had spent since I registered with the hospital. We refused.”
Dr. Uzoma, a consultant gynaecologist, said he took delivery of Faith, along with six other doctors.
He said: “First of all, it’s not my hospital, it’s a Catholic hospital. I’m a consultant gynaecologist with the hospital. Faith Obinna was my patient. I gave her my phone number; if I wanted to steal her baby, I wouldn’t have given her my number. The true situation of things is that in November 2019, I asked her to do a scan, which she did in the hospital, with one of our male staff. The scan showed two foetuses.”
