Traumatic experience at King George Hospital (King Dinuzulu Hospital)

On the 7th of July 2024, my wife amd I welcomed our baby boy to the world. This should have been the proudest moment of our lives, unfortunately, it was the most traumatic moments for my wife, baby and I.

When we reached the hospital at 5:30am on Sunday, I was not allowed to go into the ward with my wife even though I was told by our clinic that I would be.

After seeing the doctor, my wife was told that she was 4cm dilated and in labour. The doctor informed my wife that she would not be sent to the early labour ward and will be kept downstairs in the labour ward as she was progressing fast. However, as soon as the doctor left, the nurses said that he didn't know what he was doing and insisted that my wife was only 2cm so she was sent upstairs to the early labour ward.

Following this, my wife started to bleed and they said it was normal. When they checked on her an hour later, she was 6cm and told her that they don't know why she was sent upstairs and needs to go back downstairs again. Before sending her down, they did her internal check while she was contracting and hurt her in the process. She was then made to carry her own hospital bag back downstairs while bleeding, dilating, and experiencing painful contractions.

When she reached 8cm, the nurses got her onto the bed, broke her water and while adjusting the position of the bed, dropped her forward, while in active labour. They then laughed and told her that she was heavy. When picking her up and repositioning the bed, they dropped her back causing her to hit her head.

I was then asked to come in to calm my wife down, when I walked in, she was placed in a very uncomfortable position and she told them they are hurting her. This angered the nurses, and they stopped everything they were doing to shout at my wife for saying that and then proceeded to say she must sign papers and get out and deliver your baby at home. It was also mentioned that "it wouldn't sound right if someone walked by and heard you saying that we are hurting a patient." However, that is exactly what they were doing. They then accused my wife of trying to kick the nurse although she was adjusting her leg because of the pain. At this point they actually took off their gloves and refused to deliver the baby until i begged them to please help my wife.They then proceeded to cut her perineum but forgot to administer any form of pain killers or topical anesthesia when stitching her. This caused my wife to pass out in pain. When she came to, she was shaking because of the loss of blood and they did not even offer her a blanket.

When she was sent up to the maternity ward for the evening, she tried breastfeeding our baby but he wasn't latching, the nurses refused to assist her with feeding him which lead to my baby crying and starving the entire night. My wife actually carried our crying baby to the nurses station at midnight to ask for some formula for him but was sent back to her bed multiple times. She was told that our baby would die if she didn't feed him and was asked what kind of a mother is she. The nurses got irritated and took the baby saying he needs to burp. They then laid him on the bed and hit him on his back to roll him across the bed.

In the morning, a new nurse came in and heard the baby crying and noticed that he wasn't latching to my wifes breast as he was a tiny baby and she fed him some formula.

This traumatic incident occurred 2 weeks ago and has been a catalyst in my wife slipping into post partem depression to a state where she can't even produce milk for our baby anymore.

Please help us expose this evil, heartless and careless ward of nurses at this hospital.