Family members of Urvashi Singh, who delivered a stillborn baby on Monday, alleged that they had to go about asking civic hospitals to take her throat swab.
Family members of Urvashi Singh, who delivered a stillborn baby on Monday, alleged that they had to go about asking civic hospitals to take her throat swab.
And after making multiple rounds to two private and two civic hospitals and wasting crucial five days, she was put on a ventilator at Kastuba on Monday afternoon. Investigations are on to find out if the running around cost her child because BMC officials have said that the child had been dead for at least 24 hours.
The 27-year-old Mira-Bhyander resident tested positive for influenza H1N1 on Monday; but by that time her lungs were in bad shape and she had full-blown Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome. Her family alleged that doctors at Bhagwati Hospital did not take her throat swab. They told them that she had fever. Later, she went to Siddharth Hospital on Saturday where they had an isolation ward. “But doctors told us to return on Sunday as they were tired,” Singh’s brother Om Prakash said. “After a heated argument, they agreed to admit her. After admission they suggested that we should shift her to Kasturba.”
In between, her family tried out private hospitals as well. After Bhagwati, Singh went to Sanjeevani Hospital at Mira Road where she was registered for delivery. “Doctors gave her some medicines as she was suffering from falciparum malaria and her platelet count was going down,” Om Prakash said. “But we rushed her to Tanwar Hospital at Mira Road because of its ICU facility.”
BMC authorities, however, said Siddharth Hospital was not at fault. “The patient had to be shifted to Kasturba as Siddharth is not equipped to carry out high-risk deliveries,” Manisha Patankar Mhaiskar, the additional municipal commissioner, said. She also defended doctors of Bhagwati saying they did not think it was fit to administer Tamiflu to a pregnant woman with only one swine flu symptom, fever.
Singh is still on a ventilator and doctors at Kasturba said there was marginal improvement. Her husband Sarvesh said doctors at Kasturba were treating her well. “We have no complaints against the hospital.”
Dr Jayaraj Thanekar, BMC’s executive health officer, said doctors from Nair and KEM were called in to see the patient. “She is responding and her condition is improving,” he said.
‘Child was dead for at least 24 hours’
The family chose not to get into the factors that led to Urvashi Singh delivering a stillborn baby. But doctors say there is a 50-50 chance that delayed swine flu detection could have caused it. Even after cremation, the family was not given any papers or a death certificate.
“If the mother has high temperature, chances of stillbirth automatically go up,” Dr CN Purandare, the president of Federation of Obstetric and Gynaecological Societies of India (FOGSI), said. “But a pregnant women remains vulnerable to all kinds of infection and not only influenza H1N1.”
A gynaecologist from KEM, however, said, “If the viral load is large, there is every possibility that the child could be a stillborn. But, there are not enough studies to prove that swine flu leads to stillbirth.”
Dr Seema Malik, the chief medical superintendent of peripheral hospitals, said the baby was dead for at least 24 hours. “It is a macerated stillbirth. Various other complications that the mother could have been suffering from could have caused it. It may not necessarily be due to ARDS resulting from swine flu,” she said.
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