Probe ordered into infant’s death due to ‘scissor cut’

Doctor’s husband says cut was minor, infant died later due to other reasons.

ABBOTABAD:

Following the furor over the death of an infant, allegedly due to an injury received during delivery, Commissioner Hazara Division ordered an urgent probe into the incident on Saturday.

The aggrieved family, supported by political activists, protested and blocked Mansehra road following the infant’s death on Saturday, and demanded the registration of a criminal case against the doctor who delivered the child.

In a complaint lodged at the cantonment police station, the infant’s father, Yasir Ali Shah, said his wife was admitted at the Women and Children Hospital Abbottabad on Thursday afternoon. During the delivery, however, the infant received a cut on his left eye, allegedly from a scissor.

The doctor on duty, Dr Shaheen Faisal, panicked and tried to stop the bleeding, to no avail, according to the complainant. The child was then taken to the Combined Military Hospital (CMH) but died subsequently, due to profuse bleeding.

While Dr Faisal was not available for comments, her husband, speaking on her behalf, said the infant received a minor cut which was not fatal. Dr Faisal referred the infant to Ayub Medical Complex where the complainant was advised to wait for a few days before further treatment of the cut, the husband said. The complainant, however, rushed the infant to CMH where an eye specialist stitched the cut and discharged the baby after a day, he added.

The child died at home due to some other reason, Dr Faisal’s husband said, not because of the cut at the hospital.

Meanwhile Commissioner Hazara Khalid Umerzai ordered a probe into the incident and asked the police to submit an inquiry immediately. The police also wrote to the health department, asking them to hand over the accused doctor for interrogation.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 6^th, 2011.