A father here has accused doctors of causing his three-year-old son to fall into a coma by failing to provide him with adequate treatment when he was admitted to hospital. Hatem Manwar Al-Rewaithy claimed the doctors at the Maternity and Children's Hospital in Madina were responsible for causing his son's condition when he was treated there at the beginning of this month. Dr. Khaled Yassin, Director of the Health Directorate in Madina, said the Shariah Medical Committee is currently looking into the father's complaint. He stressed that the directorate would abide by any decision taken by the committee. Al-Rewaithy said he had lodged an official complaint of negligence against the doctors with the Emir's Office in Madina, the Ministry of Health and the National Society for Human Rights (NSHR). He said his son Namr was suffering from bronchitis and fever when he took him to a private hospital, which then referred him to the Maternity and Children's Hospital. Al-Rewaithy claimed that the doctors placed his son on the edge of a heater in the room because they said there was a shortage of beds. He said that because the heater was too small to hold his body, the staff placed a small wooden table under his legs. They kept him for there for four hours without medication even though he was suffering from a high fever which caused lesions on some parts of his body and resulted in hypotension (low blood pressure). As a result, his son was rushed to the intensive care unit, said Al-Rewaithy. He said an investigation at the hospital showed that his son needed a blood transfusion because of his weak immunity, but matching blood could not be found. He then asked the treating doctor to provide his son with blood or to transfer him to King Faisal Specialist Hospital in Riyadh. Al-Rewaithy claimed the doctor refused to transfer his son, but instead made him sign an undertaking that blood, which would be given to the boy, might not match his type and might even cause further complications and possibly death. The claimant said the treating doctor had caused further problems because they had fixed a urinary catheter incorrectly. This was to allow the boy to urinate because he had difficulty doing so. This allegedly affected his son's kidneys and made him suffer from urinary retention. His son also suffered from bleeding wounds to the face, ears, cheeks, forehead, hands and legs.
