Maternity horror in Mthatha hospital

A SMALL grave at the bottom of her family's vegetable patch is all that Nosibulelo Dwenga has to remind her of her first child.

And she will forever recall the faint cry her baby daughter made moments before she died.

The 25-year-old from Tyumbu, a village 16km from Mthatha in the Eastern Cape, lost her baby in Mthatha General Hospital on December 16.

Hospitals in the area are notorious for the rates of infant deaths, and a task team was set up two years ago to investigate. From January 2010 to May 2010, 180 babies died in Nelson Mandela Academic Hospital, which incorporates Mthatha General.

Dwenga this week said that her child had died through the "sheer negligence" of the medical staff.

The petite mother cried as she spoke to the Sunday Times from a bed at another government hospital, Dr Malizo Mpehle, in Tsolo, about 40km outside Mthatha. Dwenga had been admitted and given several blood transfusions after it was discovered last week that she had become anaemic.

Sizwe Kupelo, a spokesman for the Eastern Cape department of health, confirmed that two nurses and two doctors had since been suspended and would be facing a disciplinary hearing at the end of the month.

Said Dwenga: "I've brought my horrific experience to the attention of Eastern Cape health MEC Sicelo Gqobana because I wanted to help others - [and] I want them fired."

She said that when she was admitted to the Mthatha General Hospital, she had been forced to share a bed with another patient for four days, and had been mocked by one of the nurses.

"On my second day in hospital, I thought the baby was coming and I asked the nurse to come and check for me. She took a peek and belted out [singer] Zahara's song Loliwe ," which tells of an approaching train. "Two other nurses were unconcerned, watching Generations on TV ."

Dwenga said her ordeal began on December 1 when she went to the hospital complaining of headaches. Nurses told her that the doctors were away writing exams, gave her mild painkillers and sent her away.

Dwenga returned several more times but in vain. Finally, on December 12, a private doctor wrote a letter explaining that Dwenga needed to be operated on as her baby was in trouble.

Thanks to the letter, the mother-to-be was admitted to hospital - but she only had a caesarean on December 16.

"The night before I lost my baby, a nurse said her heartbeat was very faint. I called home and asked them to fetch me and take me elsewhere, but they [the hospital] had booked me for theatre."

She said the baby seemed fine soon after birth: the little girl had cried after the nurses had slapped her on the back before taking Dwenga's daughter away.

"I went back to the ward ... and, around 1.30pm, I asked for the baby. The nurse then told me she was gone. When my mother brought clothes for the baby, I had to tell her that the baby was no longer with us. I asked her to find the body and take it home so we could bury her."

Dwenga also claimed to have seen a patient giving birth on the floor. The nurses had "said something like: 'I didn't tell you to push.'"

DA councillor Raymond Knock, who helped the young woman alert the authorities, said the "mere suspensions" of the staff was not enough.

"What we want to see is the management getting more involved in the running of hospitals and not just being happy with sitting in their nice offices," he said.