THE Linden Hospital Complex (LHC) recorded the latest maternal death here Monday evening when 41-year-old Jennifer Gill of Amelia’s Ward, Linden, died following the delivery of a bouncing baby boy on Sunday evening.

Gill was scheduled to have a C-section, but delivered vaginally which triggered subsequent complications. She was then transferred to the Intensive Care Unit where she died around 20:00 hrs on Monday. Chief Executive Officer of the LHC, Dr Mohammed Riyasat, told the Guyana Chronicle on Tuesday that the hospital is currently awaiting a post-mortem to make a definitive pronouncement on the cause of death. While Gill’s daughter Sarah Gill was too emotional to speak, her niece Tashanna Gill said that the family is still in shock at the passing of her aunt.

She revealed that her aunt had no prior complications and the only reasons she had to deliver via C-section was because of her age and the weight of the baby. “She had the paper and everything showing she had to get a C-Section and she went to the hospital around 7’o’ clock Saturday morning, when her water bag burst and she got the baby around 10 Saturday night,” Tashanna related. When the family questioned why she was not given a C-section, they were told that no doctor was present to perform it. After Gill began to bleed profusely, she was taken up to the theatre to have a hysterectomy performed and it was then the situation got worse. “We were waiting for her to come out of the theatre and she looked lifeless when she came out; they took her down to the ICU and when we went back her eyes were dried and her nose looked like it had blood, it looked dried and they had cotton at her nose and they told us that she cannot get any sunlight. They told us that she needed blood and a medication that is only available at Woodlands (Hospital), we rushed to get the medication and came back with it,” the grieving Gill said. Their efforts however proved futile, since the doctor related to them that nothing is working and if a C-section was administered, it would have been worse. “When they told us that she was dead and we went in to see her, she had already swollen and was blue, so we believe that she died since she came out of the theatre and they were waiting until after the 24hrs to make it look like it was not a maternal death,” Tashanna Gill related.
The family is calling on the Ministry of Public Health to carry out a thorough investigation into the matter. Jennifer Gill had two children prior to her meeting her demise. It has been nine years since the LHC recorded a maternal death.