By Botho Molosankwe
A doctor has been hauled over the coals at the Health Professions Council of South Africa after a 3-year-old patient died under his care.
Nathan MacHattie went to the Brits Medi-Clinic to have his tonsils and adenoids removed. However, what was supposed to be a routine operation turned fatal when he died after three operations, performed on the same day within hours of each other.
In one of the operations, his doctor, Dr Harald Wenhold, acted as both surgeon and anaesthetist. The toddler's condition deteriorated after the third operation. After losing a considerable amount of blood, Nathan died in the intensive care unit on March 24, 2006.
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Even though an inquest is under way in Brits to determine the cause of the toddler's death, postmortem results show that Nathan had blood in his lungs and that there was not enough oxygen in his body at the time of death.
After his death, Nathan's parents, Shawn, 37, and Annelize, 28, lodged a complaint with the HPCSA to determine whether anyone who cared for their child at the hospital could have been negligent in handling him.
Wenhold was then charged with failing or neglecting to diagnose the cause of severe hypoxemia (lack of oxygen) in Nathan.
The second charge was failing or neglecting to request Nathan's chest x-ray, neglecting to refer Nathan to a specialist for further treatment on time, neglecting to keep appropriate or proper anaesthetic records, and acting as both surgeon and anaesthetist during the performance of a tonsillectomy and an adenoidectomy on Nathan.
During a hearing that was held in Pretoria yesterday, Wenhold pleaded not guilty to all the charges. With regards to the first charge, he said: "I am not guilty. As far as I am concerned, there was no hypoxemia present."
Wenhold said that not having x-rays of Nathan's chest was justified because he did not feel that not having them would influence treatment at that stage.
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