Why accident victims die in emergency rooms – Physicians

Emergency physicians say the deaths of some accident victims taken to the accident and emergency units of most hospitals in the country are due to lack of manpower, equipment and shortage of blood in the blood blank.

The physicians say they feel bad seeing a patient die when, ordinarily, they would have survived if the hospitals were equipped to effectively handle emergencies, particularly victims of road traffic accidents.

Sharing their experiences with PUNCH HealthWise, casualty officers note that anybody can be in emergency situation at any time, urging the government to address the gaps.

Dr. Arome Adejo, who works at the Accident & Emergency Department, Federal Medical Centre, Abuja, told our correspondent that most tertiary hospitals across the country do not have a computed tomography scan [CT scan] to attend to accident victims that are brought in unconscious.

Narrating his experience at FMC Lokoja before he was transferred to FMC Abuja, Adejo said, ” The only thing you can do for an accident victim that is unconscious is to do a CT scan. Unfortunately, many tertiary hospitals in the country do not have the equipment.

“As we speak, FMC Lokoja does not have a CT scan despite the volume of accident victims that it records almost on a daily basis. When I was working there, we used to send patients to the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital, Kwara State; or the National Hospital, Abuja, for a CT scan.

Most tertiary hospitals across the country lack CT scan to attend to unconscious accident victims.

“So, a patient that is unconscious and he is being taken to Abuja for a scan will certainly not make it.

“Do you know how many patients that have died because there is no CT scan? Most times, even the CT scan in some of the government-owned hospitals are not working when you go there.”

He noted that a tertiary hospital should have a CT scan, lamenting that equipment needed to treat accident victims are not available.

“Patients with head injury, how can they be evaluated when the equipment is not there?

“Most times, when I recall the faces of those I was supposed to have saved but who died as a result of lack of equipment, I feel bad. You know that this person is not supposed to die.

“There are some preventable deaths in our emergency units. So, the government should have an emergency fund that hospitals can access to treat accident victims.

“The government should also encourage doctors to work in primary healthcare centres by paying them well. Most of the times, what you see on the road are primary healthcare centres without doctors and they can’t handle emergencies,” he said.

Another emergency physician who works at the Accident & Emergency Department, Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital, Sagamu, Dr. Dotun Osikoya, expressed concerns over the lack of some specialties required in the emergency units.

Sharing his experience with PUNCH HealthWise, Osikoya said, “We are low in manpower in the emergency unit. Emergency care must be holistic. The hospital is close to the Lagos-Ibadan expressway.

“If an accident victim with severe head injury that needs neurological surgical intervention is brought, we don’t have a neurosurgeon to treat the patient. So, you need to transfer this patient to where he can have neurological surgical intervention.

“If the victims are brought by the road safety corps and they have head injuries, what we can only do is resuscitation. Now, how will they have neurological intervention when we don’t have a neurosurgeon and the victims’ relatives are not around?

“That is why I am talking about the issue of manpower. Because of the peculiarity of our location, we receive accident victims every other day in our facility.”

Continuing, he said, “I have seen patients who died because of lack of access to blood and neurological interventions. I feel bad about it because it could have been prevented if these things were on ground.

“Many times, I run from the emergency to the blood bank to see if I could get blood for a patient, but the logistics are not there.

“You can only try your best. If there is no blood in the blood bank, there is nothing you can do. It is part of the problem we are facing,” he said.

He urged Nigerians to freely donate blood and also form the habit of regular blood donation.