A father who lost two babies at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital two years ago has shared a harrowing experience of how they died, and how, through a miracle, his wife survived and finally gave birth after a third attempt.
Mr Owusu Ansah wept when he recounted the ordeal he went through with his wife at the Mother and Baby Unit (MBU) of the hospital.
Speaking on the special edition of Joy FM’s Super Morning Show held in Kumasi, Mr Ansah said had it not been for God, he would have lost his third child and his wife.
Mr Owusu Ansah believes he and his wife were simply lucky. She took seed again after the two losses and this time, he ensured that she attended ante-natal services at the South Suntreso Hospital and not at KATH.
He said he wanted to do everything possible to avoid going to KATH. But the worse was yet to come.
He said his wife went into labour at midnight, he drove her to the South Suntreso hospital, only to be told by nurses that there was no doctor available to attend to her. They were therefore informed about a referral to KATH.
Unable to withstand the impact of this news, Mr Ansah said his legs gave way, and he almost fell to the ground.
“Why me? All the pain, trauma and agony that we have been through, why,” he asked himself.
But the deal was already done, so he had no choice than to accompany his wife, again, to KATH.
Their situation was treated as urgent, unlike the previous deliveries where his wife had to queue and wait her turn, he said they were attended to immediately they arrived at KATH.
This time, his wife went through a normal delivery and was delivered of a baby girl who again weighed 4.5kg.
This meant that she needed to be sent to the MBU, where she will be given medication and monitored. Again she was put in a cot with seven other children.
The news didn’t go down well with Mr Ansah when he was informed, and it was no surprise when he was again told that his child had picked up an infection.
“So it means I cannot go home?”, he asked, with all hopes dashed and the fears of losing another child beginning to set in.
His wife also picked up an infection from the MBU on the third day.
“When I came to see her the following morning, she looked pale and her demeanour was not the best, so she was admitted.
“They wrote prescriptions for me to buy for the baby and the mother,” at this point, Mr Ansah could not take it anymore. He broke down in tears while he shared the experience, he has had to relive.
When he managed to pull himself together, he continued and said “when I climbed the stairs after getting the medication, at this point, I was in a dilemma. I didn’t know who to go to first, the mother or the baby.”
But as a husband whose wife had been through the unbearable, he chose to go to her first. On his return to the MBU, he could not find his baby in her cot.
When he inquired, he was told that she was with one of the doctors. The doctor upon seeing Mr Ansah warned him to be swift in attending to the child because her breathing pattern was not normal.
He asked him to keep his eyes on her and be vigilant otherwise the unimaginable could happen.
“I did not know what he meant by that,” the baffled man who was only a father, not a doctor wondered how he could keep his eyes on his child when he had no medical training and there were no doctors and nurses present.
Mr Ansah could only stay at the MBU until 10:00 PM. Normally, men wouldn’t even be allowed to stay that long, but due to the nature of his case, he was allowed.
Before he left the hospital, he was assured by doctors that a nurse will be designated to attend to his baby, so he should go home and rest.
Even with this assurance, he said he could not sleep, he kept asking himself “so is my baby alive?”
Until today, Mr Ansah believes that, but for divine intervention, his wife and daughter would not have survived.
“Until today, I don’t know how my wife and baby survived. I will describe this situation as paranormal, supernatural. I thought I was going to lose both of them,” he said.
The baby girl turned one on the 21st of February this year and Mr Ansah described the feeling as incredible.
He called on government and concerned stakeholders to immediately put measures in place to complete a 43-year-old uncompleted structure meant to augment the maternity ward at KATH.
“Where is the money that is supposed to be used to complete this building, because there is a lack of space and our wives and babies are dying. Our nieces and nephews are dying at the MBU and it is not supposed to be so.”
He added that “Whatever needs to be done for this building to be completed, they should put their heads together and find an antidote to the solution.”
SOURCE: myjoyonline.com
