‘Take your baby home to die’
Doctors cannot help infant born with rare brain condition Mom told son will not live longer than two weeks
A North West mother says she was told at the local hospital to take her baby home to die after he was born with a condition doctors could not treat.
“They told me to go back home and wait for my baby to die. I was confused and cried after hearing this,” she said.
This was after Baitshepi Leselo, 30, from a Vryburg informal settlement gave birth to Goitsemodimo on May 15. The baby was born with his brain out of his skull (encephalocele).
Leselo said after giving birth she and the baby were transferred from the Joe Morolong Hospital to Klerksdorp Hospital for an operation.
She said when they arrived at Klerksdorp Hospital, the neurosurgeon said it was too risky for the baby to be operated on, and that she must go back home as there was nothing they could do.
She was sent back to Joe Morolong, and when she arrived there her husband Eric Leselo and her mother were called in. That was when a senior health official from the district explained the condition to them.
“She told us that it was impossible for my baby to live for two weeks and that we must go back home and wait for him to die ... but I was confident that he would survive,” she said.
Eric said their son’s condition is painful. “I don’t sleep well at night ... when he is too quiet, I pinch him or shake him to check whether he is still alive,” he said.
Goitsemodimo’s head releases liquid, so his bandages have to be changed every three days at the hospital.
“Nurses are also scared of him; some refuse to dress him, and we have to wait for a brave nurse to assist him,” the father said. “I wonder how he is going to crawl or walk with the brain as big as this. If we had money or medical aid we could have attended to his condition while the brain was still small,” Leselo said.
While her husband is unemployed, Leselo is a temporary worker at the local municipality. She patrols the streets at night, earning R4 500 a month.
Health MEC Magome Masike said the doctor could be charged for being insensitive.
“It does not sound correct [what the family was told], but it needs to be confirmed so that we can charge the doctor.”
Masike said the baby’s brain was inoperable.
“When the baby is like that there is nothing we can do, we cannot operate it.”
There’s nothing we can do, we can’t operate