Mbagathi Hospital’s goofs that led city mum to trek carrying dead baby
City Hall has admitted that laxity and inefficiencies in operations at Mbagathi Hospital were behind a mother’s trek with her dead baby from the hospital to City Mortuary.
A public outcry ensued last week when it was reported in local dailies that Ms Immaculate Auma was forced to walk for close to five kilometres carrying the corpse of her six-month-old baby to the Kenyatta National Hospital Police Post and later to City Mortuary after the infant allegedly died at Mbagathi.
Nairobi County acting Health minister Charles Kerich said lack of a utility vehicle at the hospital, non-vigilant security guards and an inefficient flow of information at the county hospital led Ms Auma to take the agonising walk to the mortuary.
He said the nurse and the clinical officer who attended to the baby submitted an incident report. It was later reviewed by the hospital’s management team, which identified gaps in services at Mbagathi.
“These gaps are an inefficient customer care desk, non-vigilant security at the gate, a not-so-comprehensive death notification form and lack of a utility vehicle,” said Mr Kerich.
Mr Kerich denied reports that the infant was admitted and later died at the facility, saying the baby was confirmed dead on arrival by a paediatric clinical officer when Ms Auma arrived at 9.45am on Wednesday.