A mother whose only son died after treatment in a Lagos hospital tells her heartbreaking story:

Mrs. Lillian Essien is a distraught woman. Her anguish was palpable as she spoke amidst tears. She just lost her only son — two-year-old Shawn.

Essien’s story is telling. Prior to her son’s birth, she had suffered a “terrible miscarriage” and was trying to recover when she got pregnant again. According to her, Shawn’s birth brought her joy, adding that the boy was a constant excitement to her while he lived.

She spoke in a disconsolate voice; weak, resigned and quiet..

Her words were filled with anguish and cry for justice as she narrated how her son died due to “negligence” of a Lagos private hospital, De Vitals Cares Hospital, Ilogbo in Ojo Local Government Area.

Essien said she wanted the private hospital to be brought to book for the untimely death of Shawn. According to her, the hospital did not give her son the appropriate treatment.

She told PUNCH’s Bayo Akinloye what happened on the day she took her only son to De Vitals.

“On December 9, 2015, I took my two-year-five-month-old son to De Vitals Cares Hospital at Babalola Bus Stop in Ilogbo for treatment. My child had been restless all night and had woken up weak and with yellowish eyes. We hurriedly left the house very early in the morning and got to the hospital a few minutes past 7am. They inserted a cannula (into his body), took his blood and put him on intravenous fluid immediately (after) his blood had been taken.

“I asked the medical doctor attending to him why the IV was given and what drugs were being injected into the IV, since the results of the tests weren’t out yet. And my son wasn’t passing out stool or vomiting. He murmured ‘B-complex’ and walked away. About an hour later, the doctor walked back into the room and I asked him if the test results were out and what the results of the tests were, he said he would be back and walked out again. He kept coming in and out of the room without telling me what the results were.

“This got me very worried. I started to feel something was horribly wrong with my son and that was why he didn’t want to tell me what the results were. The next time he came into the room I told him I wanted to know what the test results were and he said it was acute malaria and his PCV (packed cell volume) was 18 per cent and that he might need a blood transfusion,” Essien said.

Another IV, a saline solution, she noted was given to her son, with the hospital medical staff saying it will “wash away the yellowness from my son’s eyes.”

But her son’s condition worsened.

“My son became very restless when the second IV fluid got half way and it seemed like he was trying hard to breathe. I asked three nurses that came into the room if they had a nebulizer but they all didn’t seem to know what a nebulizer was. They said I shouldn’t be scared that it’s malaria parasite that made him restless. They kept assuring me that by the next morning, he will be fine,” Shawn’s mother said.

With Shawn’s health not improving, the hospital reportedly gave him a third and a fourth IV. At the third IV, his stomach, arms and feet were double of their sizes, his mother said. Despite the baby’s worsening condition, Essien said the hospital assured her the baby would be fine.

“My son seemed to be finding it so hard to breathe. The doctor came in again and I asked him exactly what all the IV fluids were for; that my child wasn’t passing out any stool neither was he vomiting. I don’t think he needs any more IV fluid. He left the room immediately and less than a minute later a nurse came in and said the doctor asked her to take out the IV.

“At about 10.33pm, the doctor came into the room and I said, ‘Doctor, please help me. My baby isn’t getting any better.’ He replied ‘Madam, pray to God to help you!’ He said he had decided to transfer my son and he wrote a referral letter for me to take my son to another hospital. My son had started gasping and his eyes seemed to have gone right into their sockets and looking even more yellowish,” she added.

By midnight, Essien and Shawn arrived at Isolo General Hospital. The chubby two-year-old was said to have arrived too late as he died about two minutes after he arrived the hospital.

“We got to the Isolo General Hospital, past midnight. The doctor on call seemed shocked after reading the referral letter. I remember him murmuring ‘What kind of stupid doctor administered all this medication to a child!’ He immediately put my son on oxygen and my son passed away in my arms after about two minutes.

Two weeks after Shawn’s death, Essien got a call from one Dr. Vitalis Mezie, the Chief Medical Director of the private hospital that treated her baby.

“I got a call from a certain Dr. Vitalis. He said he was the owner and medical director of the hospital where my son was treated. And that he was calling to apologise for the incompetence of his staff, which led to my son’s demise. He asked if I could send my address, so that he can come and apologise face to face and pay condolence. He came over a few days later with a member of his staff called Jerry.

“According to Dr. Vitalis, on the day I brought my son to his hospital, he had a court case in Ijebu-Ode (in Ogun State) and left a certain doctor in charge. The doctor in charge had to go for Shiloh 2015 (Winners Chapel Church’s convention/crusade), and (that doctor) invited another doctor who is a friend to stand in for him in the hospital.

“Dr. Vitalis went ahead to explain to us (my mother, my husband and I) how a nurse had called him to explain the situation at the hospital and he ordered that my son should be transferred to another hospital, because he didn’t want my son to pass away in his hospital.

He said when he was contacted while away in Ijebu-Ode, he knew his staff had ‘messed’ up, and it was ‘too late.’ He promised that the doctor who treated my son would visit to ‘apologise’ for his mistakes. My husband asked him what the doctor’s name was and he claimed he didn’t know, that when he came back from Ijebu-Ode and heard the entire story of what happened, he ‘beat the hell out’ of the doctor and asked him never to come close to his hospital. He never brought the doctor to apologise,” Shawn’s mother narrated.

But when Punch contacted Dr. Mezie, he denied taking responsibility for the two-year-old’s death.

“I have told her that the medical doctor who attended to her son is not our doctor. He was just on a visit. We are not responsible for the death of her son. It is not negligence of the hospital. You know some of these general hospitals give a bad image of private hospitals; maybe they are having problems with them (private hospitals), I don’t know.

“What happened was that the woman refused blood transfusion when she was told that her son’s PCV level was 18 – that was what my doctor told me when I came back. She said she didn’t want blood transfusion.

“While I was away (in Ijebu-Ode), and was informed that the baby’s condition was not improving I told my staff to discharge the baby immediately. The baby did not die in the hospital; the baby died at the general hospital. Nobody knew what they did in the general hospital with the baby. The medical doctor who treated the son was a visiting doctor. I was not around and my doctor was not around.

“I didn’t go to apologise for any negligence on the part of my hospital. I only went there to sympathise with her. Apologise for what? Why should we apologise? The baby died in the general hospital. How can we apologise? What are we apologising for? We did not apologise. In the normal Igbo culture, if someone dies, you go and visit; and he was our patient. We referred him (to another hospital) and a patient died and we are there to find out what happened,” De Vitals’ medical director said.

Essien, however, refuted Dr. Mezie’s claim that she did not allow the hospital to give her son blood transfusion, saying that she is not a Jehovah’s Witness who will refuse blood transfusion on religious grounds.

“The doctor that attended to my son mentioned once that my son might need blood transfusion and never again in the 16 hours I spent in that hospital was the issue of my baby needing blood mentioned. Never! I have had two cesarean sections. In both major operations, two pints of blood were demanded by the hospital I used; my husband provided the blood, which I didn’t use at the end of the day.

“I am knowledgeable about these things and if I can get blood for myself why would I refuse blood for my son? Why didn’t they refer me to another clinic immediately since they claimed I refused that my son should be transfused? Why did they keep us there for a whole 16 hours and kept pumping his tiny body with IV fluids?” she said.

Dr. Mezie also denied any attempt to shield the identity of the doctor who treated Shawn.

“I am not hiding the identity of the medical doctor. I will give you the number of my doctor who brought him,” he promised.

He had not done so until this report was filed. Repeated phone calls and text messages to the medical director did not yield any fruit.

The Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria has however expressed its interest in the case.

In an email sent to her following Essien’s complaint about how her son was treated at De Vitalis, the MDCN said it was ready to investigate the allegations against Dr. Mezie and his hospital staff.

“We’re in receipt of your email complaining about the negligence of one Dr. Vitalis. Matters like the one you complained about are dealt with by the Medical and Dental Practitioners’ Investigation Panel. By the rules of the panel, you are required to reduce your complaint to the form of an affidavit deposed to before a Commissioner of Oath or Notary Public. The affidavit should reach us as soon as possible to enable us ignite the process as prescribed by law,” it said.

When contacted the Secretary of the MDPIP, Dr. Emejo Abdul, told PUNCH that, “We don’t discuss matters under investigation in the public.”

Essien said she was determined to get justice for her son. “I am going to petition the Nigeria Police Force. This man (Dr. Mezie) and his hospital must be investigated. I will like the medical association to please investigate this man and his hospital, to prevent more lives being lost either to carelessness or negligence and to avoid a situation whereby any human being will pass through the emotional pain and trauma I am currently going through due to the death of my only son,” she cried.

A 72-year-old man on Saturday married his 60-year-old lover who had been living with him for 45 years. The couple were married at a mass wedding at a church, Omega Power Ministries, in Port Harcourt.

According to the church’s post, the wedding ceremony which was financed by the church involved 140 other couples who had lived together for many years without being properly married.

The church said it provided money for the bride price, wedding gown for brides, suits, shirts and ties for the grooms and all that.

According to the OPL General Overseer, Chibuzor Chinyere, he conducted the wedding ceremony so that the couple and others will not be condemned by God.

“I decided to do this because everyday, I get sleepless nights because of the amount of people living together when God has not joined them. It is a sin before God. Do you know that one out of every five people you see on the street are living together without being legally married? If rapture happens now, they will all miss rapture. So what is the solution? Solution number one: couples must live apart until you get money to wed, which is very risky.

“Any of those women can be my sister or maybe she already has five children. The woman will suffer. And a strange woman may come in. Solution number two: Legalise their union. But many don’t have money to legalise it. They already have children, but no money to pay bride price. So that is why I decided to intervene, so that when rapture happens they shall not be found wanting,” Chinyere said.

Speaking further, he stated, “What is a church building when the people inside the building have visa to go to hell fire? Salvation is better than a beautiful church building.

That is why I conducted marriage blessing for 140 couples at the OPM headquarters. By the grace of God, I gave them money to pay bride prices. I bought wedding suits and gowns including shirts and tie for 140 couples.

I paid for their marriage certificates and also food and drinks at the reception. Now I can sleep well knowing that an additional 140 souls have been added to the kingdom of God.”

Tragedy struck at the Ijaiye area of Lagos State on Saturday after the corpse of a vulcanizer identified as Fatai Sulaimon was found hanging in the kitchen, Punch reports.

According to reports, the deceased took his life early in the morning for reasons yet to be ascertained, leaving behind his wife and two children. Eyewitnesses claim there was nothing around the scene to indicate the reason for the suicide.

Neighbours stated that nobody suspected anything until his corpse was discovered in the kitchen where all the tenants in the house prepare their food.

“Somebody raised the alarm and that attracted a crowd into the place. They removed the rope and brought down the corpse. He did not write any note or drop any hint as to why he killed himself. Even his wife said she could not explain what happened to him.” one of the neighbours stated.

The late Sulaimon was described as gentle and hard working by sympathisers who sometimes hired out motorcycles to people who need work.

The Police Public Relations Officer, Dolapo Badmus, revealed however that she could not confirm the incident because it was not reported at any of the surrounding divisions.

She said, “The case was not reported to the police. We implore relatives of the deceased to report such a vital case. Meanwhile, the police will commence preliminary investigation to ascertain the case.”

The corpse was said to have been deposited in a mortuary in the area.

A Unilag student who was among the group of Mass Communication students invited to Senator Ben Bruce’s 60th Birthday Celebration narrates his ordeal at the star-studded party.

Read Below:

Who is Genuine in Nigeria?

Senator Ben Murray Bruce turned 60 yesterday, he took the opportunity to launch his book “The Common Sense Revolution” but it’s sad to see that the event in its totality portrays the average Nigerian Politician.

Usually, I hate to attend these so called “Big” events but it was Ben Bruce, the common sense guy, I jumped at the Opportunity to go with my department, department of Mass Communication, University of Lagos as we were invited with a letter and we were feeling all important.

We didn’t know it was an invitation to humiliation. At the venue, we were told to go upstairs, we didn’t mind, as they said that area was reserved for students. Getting there, I realized it was a perfect view to watch the “Elites” wine and dine. Still, we didn’t care.

We only began to care when the ceremony kept going on and all tables kept getting additional contents and we were just there, like Observers. Don’t forget that we were invited, as I said earlier. While all of that kept happening, I still didn’t care because they said every guest will get a free copy of the book.

I wanted the book so, I waited on. At the end, only the guests got the Book. I had to look at our invitation to be sure we were guests. Yes, we were guests but the stiff class stratification that Senator Bruce Criticizes came to play. It’s so sad to see that the actions of the Common Sense Guy justifies the “Common Sense is not so common” statement.

Since I know it’s all fake, I’d like to give a professional PR advice. It’s so bad, if you invite Nigerian Students, who will, to a large extent, determine your political success, to an event only for them to watch you and your rich friends dine. Their votes aren’t even enough.

Writing a book about Common Sense doesn’t actually make you have Common Sense. We aren’t hungry people. We are Unilag Students and we are contented with what we have, we wouldn’t go to shop 10 to sweet-talk anyone about common sense, just to get rice.

Happy Birthday, Senator Ben! Thanks for the deceit, segregation and above all, thanks so much for the Palm oil made Jollof Rice with a meat-like object.

I am Abidemi Adesokan, A concerned Nigerian Student who believes there is hope for Nigeria, but Bruce isn’t just that guy.