Darshan Nepali, 11, of Dhurkotbastu, Gulmi died Tuesday morning after he fell while playing with friends on September 11 and dislocated his right arm at the elbow. [break]He was admitted at the hospital Sunday and complications developed after his arm was plastered on Monday.
The third grader of local Kalika Boarding School, who had come to Tansen by bus with his mother Lalita, died at 11 a.m. following bleeding and swelling of the right shoulder.
The boy, who looked sprightly enought at the time of admission to the hospital, died there and the family has refused to accept the body. “The doctors would ignore it even when he cried out in pain, saying that was normal,” Lalita, who was unconscious for hours after her son´s death, told Republica on regaining consciousness. “I cried at his pain but the doctors would not listen,” she added.
The boy´s uncle, Tika Ram BK, said Darshan had turned cold immediately after his arm was plastered. “They tried to warm him up with a heater but to no avail. Then his shoulder and back also became swollen,” Tika Ram said. The doctors became more serious, the uncle added, only after the boy started bleeding black blood from his swollen shoulder.
“He had no injury when brought to the hospital apart from the elbow dislocation. The nerves may have been snapped when they stretched the arm to undo the dislocation,” Tika Ram surmised.
Hospital Director Dr Rachel Karrach said an investigation is on to find out the cause of death. “We are immensely sad on his death but we don´t know why he died. We will try to find the reason through post mortem with the family´s permission,” she said.
Dr Sabin Sharma, who was involved in the treatment, conceded that the x-ray did not show any deep injury and there weren´t any external injuries either. “His condition was normal. We never thought it would lead to this eventuality,” Dr Sharma confided. He ruled out the possibility of death from blockage of blood circulation owing to the plaster, saying that there would have been an effect on the palm in that case.
The family has accused the hospital of trying to sweep the matter under the carpet and they fear that the medical report may be changed. “When I asked for the medical report after overhearing doctors talking about tinkering with it, they refused to give it to us, saying it couldn´t be given without the permission of the hospital administration,” Tika Ram claimed. The family has been in dialogue with the hospital administration but has refused to take the body until the hospital concedes its fault.
Last year the boy´s father died of heart ailment and his younger brother had undergone surgery of the intestine at the same hospital.
A seven-month-old girl also died at the hospital a month ago after they refused to admit her in the emergency ward during the night. The family had taken the body only after the hospital agreed to provide a job to the mother and signed a five-point commitment to improve the hospital´s services.
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