‘Unpaid bills have made us ‘prisoners’ at National Hospital’
At Abuja’s National Hospital, several patients are stranded as a result of their inability to paid bills after being discharged. Some of them have been there for months and their cases are increasingly desperately, as our reporter finds out.
All the patients called on government, private organisations and individuals among others to come to their rescue so they can pay the bills and go home
Abdulmutalib Tijani, 15, was knocked down by a hit-and-run driver while returning from a mosque after Friday prayers about two months ago. He was rushed to the Trauma Centre at the National Hospital, Abuja and admitted. Three weeks ago, he was discharged but is still being held in the hospital because his mother cannot afford the N300, 000 balance they are supposed to pay the hospital.
Mariam, who came from Kogi State to take care of Abdulmutalib, said she and her younger brother who Abdulmutalib was living with before the accident could only raise N50, 000.
“I took the N50, 000 to the social welfare unit of the hospital but they told me that I have to try harder as the money is too small,” she said.
Mother and son said it has become increasingly difficult for them to feed while remaining at the hospital. And now they are appealing for help from Nigerians so they could go back home.
Paul Chuks Nwachukwu, 30, a 200 Level student of the University of Abuja and also a victim of a hit-and-run driver, has been in detention for way longer. He was discharged four months ago but not having the balance of his medical bills amounting to of N667, 000 out of the N1, 671,000, he has been forced to stay in the hospital until he pays up, his sister, Blessing, said.
According to Blessing who is the first child and bread winner of the family, they would have been able to pay the bill if they had not lost their father in an accident four years ago.
Blessing said she was always at the hospital taking care of Paul who needs assistance to move about following the accident, and could therefore not concentrate fully on the business she was doing before his admission. And with an old mother, she is practically the only one shouldering the responsibility.
Paul’s continuous detention in the hospital for four months is taking its toll on the family, and since they have no one working with the federal government to stand as a guarantor, until they can pay off their balance, there is no end in sight for Paul’s detention.
She added that Paul missed his last semester examination at the University of Abuja as a result of his detainment in the hospital.
“I wrote to the social welfare department to help us waive the bill, but they refused. I begged them to allow my brother write his exam, but the man at the social welfare said I should go away, as there is no way they can just write off , N600 000. Please help us offset this bill so we can leave the hospital. We are tired of staying here,” Blessing pleaded.
Lillian Makoji has not yet been discharged from the National Hospital but aside the pains she is nursing from gunshot wounds sustained during a robbery attack at her house in Abuja on September 1, she is very apprehensive about how she is going to pay her bill when discharged.
She said the bill now stands at N1.2 million and it would increase before she is discharged. Makoji said as it stands now, she doesn’t have any means to pay the bill, not to talk of when it increases. She has undergone surgeries and had 14 bullets removed from her stomach, she said.
“I learnt that when one doesn’t have money to pay, one can write the hospital and bring someone from a federal agency to stand as guarantor. Even that is going to be a problem for me as I don’t know any one like that who can help us. My mother came from the village to assist me in the hospital. We don’t have anything,” Ms Makoji said.
She and her mother appealed for assistance so that she doesn’t end up being detained like other patients.
Our reporter met Oluchi Eberechi looking forlorn at a corner with her 45-year-old mother. Unlike some others who are victims of hit-and-run, the man who knocked down her mother brought her to the hospital himself and left after dropping his number. But since then he has not been taking his calls.
Mrs Eberechi had come to Abuja for ‘Omugwo’, a popular practice and happy time among the Igbo ethnic group when mothers visit their daughters who have given birth and stay for some time to help take care of the newborn.
Mrs Eberechi was managed by different departments and will soon be under the care of the Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) department to manage her tracheotomy (an incision in the windpipe made to relieve an obstruction to breathing).
Oluchi who spoke on behalf of her mother said three sets of bills have been brought so far-N1.4 million, N1.4 million, N1.3 making a total of N4.2 million.
She said her family doesn’t not have any means of paying the money when she is discharged and they may end up being detained at the hospital. She has been praying hard for someone to come to their rescue, she said.
All the patients called on government, private organisations and individuals among others to come to their rescue so they can pay the bills and go home.
Daily Trust Saturday learnt that a male patient in the trauma ward who was not able to offset his bills absconded from the hospital a day earlier.
While some patients are occasionally detained in the male and female wards, majority of patients who cannot pay their bills after discharge are often found in the Trauma Centre of the hospital.
The reporter observed that many of the detained patients and their families are in dire need of assistance.
Spokesman of the National Hospital, Abuja, Dr Tayo Haastrup, said the hospital has a Social Welfare unit which assists indigent patients. He said the hospital had waived bills for a lot of indigent patients and that the cases continue to grow daily.
According to Haastrup, the Social Welfare unit waives certain amounts or whole amounts on the merit of the case when the patients and their families write to the hospital.
“Once they meet Social Welfare, we waive it for them but we sometimes don’t like saying it in front of them because we have had cases of patients who make false and exaggerated claims,” he said.
Chigoziem Ellen Onugha, a lawyer, said it is wrong for hospitals to detain patients over unpaid bills. Onugha who is a legal officer in charge of patients’ rights at Lawyers Alert, a civil society organization, said only a police station has the right to detain people.
On how he thinks hospitals can recover their money from patients, she said any hospital being owed by patients should take legal action by taking the patients to court, where the case would be handled in a way that is just to both parties.
According to her, any patient detained by a hospital has a right to sue the hospital.
But for now, those stranded at the National Hospital are in desperate need of assistance to pay their bills and return to their lives. Until then they will remain at the hospital waiting for miracle.