SCHOOLGIRL’S DEATH PROMPTS MEDICS WARNING

Even the mildest sounding complaints from children should be checked out at hospital

MUSCAT: When eight-year-old schoolgirl Leeketha Baganna complained to her parents of stomach pain, they thought they could wait a few weeks to have her treated in India during the school holidays.

Tragically, they were wrong. Last week, while studying at Indian School Seeb, Leeketha vomited three times and was sent home, still complaining of stomach pain.

“She was taken into the first aid room in the school after she was found vomiting. Immediately, we informed her parents and at around 10am, her uncle came and picked her up,” a school official said. At home, her mother, Raji- tha, called up her father, Buggaraju Baganna, who was in Nizwa. “After Leeketha’s father arrived, he took her to a private hospital at Al Khoud where she was declared dead on arrival,” her uncle Ram Mudhiraj said.

Extensive treatment

Her uncle Ram told

that her parents had planned to go for extensive treatment for Leeketha in India during the summer holidays, due to start from June 4.

“They consulted some doctors here but the cost of her treatment was very high. So they were planning for her treatment in India during summer vacation,” Ram Mudhiraj said. Regarding her health, Ram said that she had difficulty in digesting whatever she used to eat. “That is why she used to eat so little,” he said.

The tragedy of the schoolgirl’s death was that her mother – who could only speak her own Indian language Telugu – could not take her daughter to hospital as she had no transport and felt she had no means of communicating with hospital staff.

The family and the school authorities are, however, still clueless regarding the cause of her death. “She used to suffer from digestion problems often but we didn’t ever consider that she could die,” Ram said.

“Even her mother didn’t realise that she needed urgent treat- ment,” he said. School authorities said that she was complaining of stomach pain and vomited.

“That is one of the reasons we immediately informed the parents after diagnosing her,” a school official said.

“Many a time, the parents cannot judge the seriousness of the patient. The complaint may look very simple like in this case, but let the hospital decide whether it is a trivial illness or a serious illness,” Chairman of Al Hayat International Hospital in Muscat, Dr K P Raman, said.

Born on October 5, 2009, Leeketha, from the Indian state of Telangana, had been a student in Indian School Seeb for the last three years.