A man identified as Sampson Sekidika has sought justice for his 24-year-old daughter, Rebekah, whom he reported dead on Friday, February 2, 2024, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
Sekidika, an employee of the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG), while addressing journalists in Rivers State Capital, said his daughter was a first class graduate of the Benson Idahosa University, Benin, Edo State.
Alleging foul play and negligence of duty on the part of the medical workers who carried out a procedure when the daughter visited the clinic for a routine check, which he stated led to her death, Sekidika demanded justice and a thorough investigation into the circumstances that led to his daughter’s death.
His words, “Prior to February 2, my daughter had a brief clinical visit to Paragon Clinics and Imaging Diagnostics, situated at 96 Stadium Road.
“The complaint was that she had not seen her period for a while. So, she needed to know why it was that so. So, when she had the clinical visit, they subjected her to some test, including pregnancy test which came out to be all negative.
“Subsequently, they called her again to say she needed to see a specialist to be sure that there was nothing wrong with her. The specialist then booked an appointment with her to come on February 2 between midday and 1 pm for a simple procedure they called hysteroscopy.”
According to Sekidika, his daughter was healthy and had no medical condition and that he drove her with the mother to the clinic but didn’t meet the doctor when they got there between 12 pm and 1 pm. So they waited for him.
“I left them there to go and do one or two things and come back and meet them. After some two hours, around 3pm, I called my wife but she said the doctor hadn’t come.
“She (Rebekah) was supposed to travel to the United Kingdom for her Masters and PhD programmes. Everything was set, flight booked, tuition paid, everything arranged.
“So by 4pm I called my wife but she said the doctor was still not around. So I said I will be coming to pick them since he hadn’t come,” he added.
The father said when he got there around 5pm, they had already taken his daughter into the theatre around 4:30pm. He disclosed that when he asked why a theatre, they told him that was where they had the monitor, noting that he didn’t know they were going to give his daughter a spinal anaesthetic.
“I’m saying this because experts have analysed the situation. Even some doctors have looked into it. I could have easily gone to any other hospital and take care of this. But this hospital is a retainership hospital with my company, so they refer us there.”
“Around 6:50 pm, the doctor came out and broke the sad news to us that, ‘Sorry, we did everything we could, your daughter has passed.’ It was like I was in a dream. My wife started shouting and throwing herself,” the aggrieved father explained.
He disclosed that it was when his colleague, who heard of the incident, later arrived at the hospital and they insisted on asking what had transpired.
His words, “We saw a nurse and asked her to take us to where the doctor was. When we got to them, my colleague then asked them what really happened.
“The doctor pointed to the man that administered the anaesthetics that he gave my daughter spinal anaesthetic. He asked, ‘Why’? The man said 30 minutes into the procedure after he gave her the anaesthetic, it apparently numbed some parts of her body. So, he said she wanted to throw up from there she started throwing up blood.
“He said at that point he became confused. He didn’t know what to do. So that was how they tried to see how they could manage the situation until she lost so much blood and passed on.”
He expressed sadness that the hospital had not contacted him since the incident, saying it was only the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) that reached out to him to condole with him and said they too were on the matter.
Confirming the incident, Spokesperson of the Rivers State police command, Grace Iringe-Koki said investigation was going on to unravel the circumstances behind the death.