We concluded 2011 with one of the most successful events “Patient Solidarity Day.” through the support of kenyan citizens and corporate organizations we were able to give  72 very needy patients  who were detained in different Hospitals for failure  to pay their bills, a christmas treat by clearing their outstanding bills. This is in line with our strategic plan of helping de-congest public hospitals to creat room for deserving cases.

When they got to the accident and emergency unit, they found the place crowded as usual and she pushed through the crowd to get a mobile bed. After 15 minutes, which she says felt like hours, she got it and wheeled her husband to the waiting room. “I stood patiently on my husband’s bedside waiting for someone to at least examine him. But six hours later, he was yet to be attended to. I tried to grab every medical personnel that came our way but they all passed hurriedly. When my husband’s condition got worse, we finally  got the attention of a doctor. He tried to resuscitate him but it was too late,” Alice says, tears welling up in her eyes.

She says the grief was overwhelming but she was able to bear the situation and start a new life in widowhood. However, six months later, another tragedy struck and changed the life of the human resource consultant forever. Her younger brother, Morris Moses, whom she was living with after the death of their parents caught a cold that defied treatment. After two days, Morris developed breathing difficulties and was admitted to Nairobi’s Metropolitan Hospital, a private health facility. His condition got even worse and the hospital advised the family to move the young man to a facility that has an Intensive Care Unit.

Alice got an ambulance and in a few minutes, she was back at the KNH’s emergency unit with her brother. “By that time, my brother was gasping for breath. It was around 9pm. Fearing that my brother’s case could end up like my husband’s, I tried frantically to get him admitted. Despite having documents from the Metropolitan Hospital stating that my brother needed to be admitted at the ICU, a doctor insisted that he gets a CT scan then vanished. We queued for the procedure and as soon as the CT scan was done, I started a hunt for the doctor,” she says.

It was not until 5am the next day that she found him. By this time, her brother had passed out. “The doctor asked me to go look for a bed at the ICU myself. I tried all I could and got a bed at 4pm, almost 12 hours later,” she says. Ten days later, her brother was still in a coma. She says each time her family asked questions regarding her brother’s sickness, the doctors turned hostile. “They took it as a personal affront. I complained severally to the hospital’s CEO but he told me to let the doctors do their work,” says Alice .

One day, she visited the hospital and found that her brother had been moved to the general ward. He was still in a coma. Alice rushed back to the CEO but she didn’t get any help. She says her youthful and strong local basketball-star brother wasted away unattended until he was reduced to skin and bone. He died 20 days later. “No one has ever told us (the family) what killed my brother. I decided I would not keep quiet any more,” she says.

After her brother’s burial, she and her friends who claimed to have had similar experiences at various public hospitals started an organisation called Morris Moses Foundation (named after her brother) to advocate for the rights of patients. Alice, 42, quit her profession to embark on this mission. The foundation has been going around the country creating awareness on patients’ rights and asking Kenyans to speak out if they are badly treated. “We lobby for compassionate, quality and affordable health care. Medicine has become a tool of trade, instead of a calling. Doctors’ negative attitude is killing patients,” she says adding that doctors in public hospitals need to give patients customer care.
When asked to comment on Alice’s claims, Kenyatta National Hospital’s chief public relations officer Simon Ithai said, “We have responded to her allegations many times. Why don’t you visit the hospital yourself and find out whether the claims are true.”

But the situation at the hospital’s emergency unit is not very good. It is 7pm and there is a lot of hustle and bustle at the unit. Bed-ridden patients are queuing at the examination section and there seems to be only two doctors on duty. At the x-ray section, more patients, some heavily bandaged, line the corridor on their green metallic beds. They are waiting to have the procedure done so they can be admitted.

At the waiting area, Beatrice Achieng’ stands at her sister’s bedside shifting her weight from foot to foot. “We have been here since 11am,” she says. “I’m glad that she has finally been examined and we are now waiting to be admitted.” At the customer care section, a plate hanging from the roof reads, ‘Huduma bora ya afya ni haki yako’ (Quality health care is your right). But there’s no one at the desk besides a man whose badge reads ‘patient porter’. His work is to move patients around the hospital and he is apparently on a break. A woman begs him to register her so she can get a bed and remove a patient from an ambulance but he says he is not in charge of the desk.

Dr Albert Saningo, who also claims his father died due to negligence at the hospital, says the few doctors at the hospital may be overwhelmed by the huge number of patients and that is why they have a negative attitude. “My father was taken to KNH after an accident in Narok (in Rift Valley province). He was left unattended for four days after which he died,” he says. “Some of us have been bitter with the hospital for years and we are now saying we shall be silent no more,” says the Naturapathic doctor, a member of the Morris Moses Foundation Board. Enoch Murunga, a nurse at one of the mission hospitals in Nairobi says he once told off a colleague whom he heard insulting a mother who was giving birth. “She was very rude to the patient and she made me feel really bad,” he says.

The chief executive officer of the Medical Practitioners and Dentists Board, which regulates the practice of medicine in the country says professional negligence is a serious offense punishable by law. He said aggrieved patients and families should lodge complaints with the board instead of living with bitterness. “Alice should have come to us instead of complaining to KNH. We are the regulator,” he says.

Yumbya further says allegations that the board does not discipline errant medics are untrue. “Some 602 complaints have been lodged with the board and out of these  250 have been resolved,” he says. The board is currently investigating a case in which a mother died last month after surgeons at Kitui District Hospital in Eastern province allegedly left a surgical towel in her womb and ignored her pleas to have her post-operation complications revisited.

Last month, the board also suspended a doctor for six months for negligence. Dr Angela Chekoko, who was a consultant gynecologist at the Kiambu District Hospital in Central province had been accused of failing to attend to a pregnant mother, leading to her death and that of her baby. Chekoko has been sent for retraining at the University of Nairobi. Alice of the Morris Moses Foundation says punishment meted on errant doctors is not harsh enough.

But Yumbya says the laws under which the board operates do not allow it to give harsh penalties. “We can only suspend doctors and send them for retraining. But we are reviewing the laws. We also cannot handle many cases because of financial constraints. We do not receive any funding from the government.