Judge dies extracting tooth, Family accuses Hospital

The family of Abdulwahab Mohammad, a judge at the Grade 1 Area Court, Kubwa, Federal Capital Territory, who died of complications arising from a tooth extraction, has accused the National Hospital, Abuja, of negligence.

The family alleged that the deceased was neglected by the personnel at the emergency unit of the hospital for two hours before he died last Saturday.

The 32-year-old deceased, who was said to have undergone a procedure to extract his tooth at the Kubwa General Hospital,reportedly slumped and was rushed to the National Hospital, where he died.

Abdulwahab’s elder brother, Abdulkareem, said the judge might have survived if the personnel at the Trauma Centre of the hospital had promptly attended to him.

Abdulkareem said that after the procedure, the late judicial officer bled for over nine days, adding that subsequent visits to the Kubwa General Hospital did not solve the problem.

According to him, the deceased was subsequently rushed to a private hospital last Saturday, where he was given oxygen to stabilise him before he was evacuated to the National Hospital.

Abdulkareem said, “It is painful and we may press charges against the National Hospital to teach them a bitter lesson; what they did was medical negligence; it is unethical. You can’t keep a patient out for two hours without oxygen after the one he was on got exhausted.

“My brother was taken to the National Hospital with oxygen from another hospital. For two hours, he was outside, they never cared and they called the unit an emergency unit. Of what use is the emergency unit in a hospital when you don’t care if a patient lives or dies?

“He was not attended to and by the time they secured a bed space, in less than an hour, he was gone because there was no proper care. They didn’t attend to him; they just allowed my brother to suffer and die.”

Abdulkareem also threatened that the family might drag the dentist, who performed the tooth extraction on the deceased, before the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria for doing a shoddy job.

He said, “He (dentist) made him (Abdulwahab) to bleed for more than nine days. Even if the tooth broke during the procedure, thereare instruments used for removing the splinters, I’m a medical scientist, Iknow what I’m saying.

“If you want to do a job, do it the way it should bed one, especially one involving human life.”

Abdulkareem noted that his late brother was expecting his first child, adding that he got married in May this year.

A colleague and friend of the deceased, Umar Kotangora, spoke in the same vein, stating, “His blood level was about seven per cent while the oxygen he was given had long been exhausted by the time he was admitted; he died shortly afterwards. It was so painful.”

When contacted, Chief Medical Director, Kubwa General Hospital, Dr Muideen Lasisi, denied admitting the late judge for treatment.

“We did not admit any judge by that name for care in our hospital; most seriously sick people are admitted before transfer or referral,”he said in response to an SMS.

The National Hospital’s spokesman, Dr Tayo Haastrup,promised to find out about the alleged delay in admitting Abdulwahab, but he did not respond to subsequent calls and SMS.