Bridget Moleboheng was due to give birth over December and was taken to the Sebokeng Hospital in the Vaal Triangle. But when the time came, she was forced to deliver her own baby. The only “help” she received from the nurses on duty was when they took time out of laughing and chatting in the corridor outside her room to tell her to keep quiet.

Moleboheng claims she was forced to lie in her own blood for six hours and was refused assistance by nurses in December last year.

“Because I had the temerity to ask that I be attended to I was called ‘Madam’ and everybody went out of their way to be rude to me. The nurses kept screaming at me that I should keep quiet. At this point the baby was being born and still I was being ignored. While I was in agony and scared to push on my own, the nurses left the ward then went to sit at the corridor and continued chatting and laughing. They made it clear that I was going to be ignored because I had dared to ask questions and that I had behaved like a ‘madam’. After my boy was born I pleaded with the nurses in the ward again to help my baby who at this point was turning purple. I asked them to help  him even if they did not want to help me. I had spoken to my husband on my cell phone to tell him of my desperate plight but he was refused permission by the security guards at the hospital to enter. Despite the fact that there was non-medical staff including males walking through the ward, I was left lying naked in my own blood and the doctor that was supposed to attend to me was seeing other patients who were admitted before me. Eventually removing my afterbirth was also performed with the utmost callousness with the doctor blaming the pain he was causing me on the fact that I was ‘fat’. He ignored my screams that he was hurting me and treated me worse than a dog.”

She has now decided to sue the state for “substantial damages sustained”.

Gauteng health department spokesperson Simon Zwane said yesterday it was the first he had heard of the case. Of course it was.

“Every citizen has a right to recourse in court if they feel they have not been treated appropriately. We will await the papers from the lawyers and once all the facts have been accessed, we will decide whether to defend the matter.”

Not “treated appropriately”? Understate much, Mr. Zwane?

[Source: News24]