A team of four experts has been set up and sent to Jinja Regional Referral Hospital to investigate a matter in which medical interns amputated the hand of a baby during delivery.
The team will be led by Dr. Joel Okullo (Chairperson Uganda Medical and Dental Practitioners Council).
Ministry of Health and Uganda Medical and Dental Practitioner’s Council has blamed the incident on the absence of supervision.
In a preliminary report, two medical interns accidentally cut a tot’s arm while conducting a cesarean section due to a lack of supervision last week. The tot is currently undergoing treatment at the hospital.
The report presented by the Primary Health Care State Minister, Dr. Joyce Moriku Kaducu to the Parliamentary Health Committee, shows that the two interns carried out an emergency C-Section to save the life of a woman who was bleeding uncontrollably.
According to Dr. Moriku, the expectant mother identified as Betty Biribawa was 32 weeks pregnant when she was admitted to the hospital.
Biribawa paid 250 thousand shillings to the two medical interns before the emergency C-Section.
The Ministry has also learned that medical interns usually extort money from patients before handling them.
The Committee Chairperson, Dr. Michael Bukenya told the minister that the incident at Jinja Regional Referral Hospital is an example of many, where supervisors could have left interns to take charge of sensitive matters on their own.
He said that the Ministry is also responsible because it has hardly made oversight visits to the hospital in the past year.
Director General Health Services, Dr. Henry Mwebesa, said Jinja Regional Referral Hospital has three specialists who are also expected to supervise the interns.
Dr. Okullo says the final report will be issued in one month’s time. The Ministry of Health has deployed 1,170 medical interns for the 2019/2020 internship period.
