NUH apologized for leaving a pregnant woman bleeding and unattended for hours. As a result, the woman lost her baby.
The hospital said she suffered from a placental abruption, which is a “rare” and “unpredictable” complication. It added that it was sorry and should have done more for the mother.
It said it will review its processes so that such an incident will not happen again. But it also mentioned that its staff are already overworked. It is challenging for them to maintain standards of care as they are short of manpower. Then how are they going to provide better care for their patients? If they had more staff, could the tragedy be avoided? Is this a result of a bigger problem?
Many times, Health Minister Ong Ye Kung acknowledged the lack of manpower and the stress on healthcare workers. But is he and MOH doing enough to address the problem? What exactly are they doing? Even as we speak, Ong Ye Kung and MOH have not released statements about the incident. What does this tell us?
We are in a pandemic but it is MOH’s duty to take action and solve the problem. Otherwise, there is no guarantee that similar incidents will not happen again. If it takes a tragic, viral post to get them to wake up and get their gears going, then something is terribly wrong.
Our deepest condolences to the affected family.
