Comatose Filipina awaits repatriation
Hospitals report mounting bills of several patients in similar conditions
Nobody wants to meet Alicia De Los R., not even her son, as she blinks and shuts her eyes in a city hospital with the staff being her only companions.
The 53-year-old Filipina, who suffered hypoxia (deprivation of oxygen supply, in this case to the brain) during a cardiac arrest, has been lying in a vegetative state at the Aster Hospital Mankhool for the last four months, awaiting repatriation to her country with no one coming forward to help.
It is also a sad reminder about the fate of many such patients either on visit or expired visas lying in a coma state in public and private hospitals in the country with nowhere to go.
Dr Chaitanya Prabhu, a specialist in internal medicine and an intensivist attending on De Los, told Gulf News that the patient who had worked in the UAE for 14 years was on a tourist visa, visiting her son. On June 7, she was brought to the hospital emergency by a cab driver. She was feeling uneasy and, instead of calling for an ambulance, hailed a cab and asked to be driven to Rashid Hospital emergency, But on the way, she collapsed with a massive cardiac arrest and her brain was deprived of oxygen. The cabbie rushed her to the emergency section of the hospital where she was resuscitated and stabilised. However, the lack of oxygen and blood supply to her brain resulted in extensive damage to both lobes rendering her in a coma.”
Dr Alai Taggu, head of the department of critical care at the hospital attending on De Los, said: “The patient had a history of diabetes and hypertension and we made sure her air passage is clear and have a tracheotomy tube in her throat to clean the air passage. She is breathing on her own.”
The hospital has in the last four months spent Dh500,000 on her care as she has no insurance cover and her son who is unable to afford the hospital expense has also stopped taking any calls from the hospital staff.
Dr Sherbaz Bichu, CEO of the hospital, said: “We have done what we could, and see that the patient might be better off if flown home and is with her loved ones. She needs to be in a similar hospital or health-care facility. There is nothing more we can do for Alicia now. It is very sad.”
Meanwhile, the Philippines Consul-General Paul Raymund Cortes told Gulf News, “The Philippine consulate has been in charge of Alicia’s case from day one. We have been coordinating with hospital authorities and administration in regard to her condition and to her hospitalisation bills. Secondly, the Philippine government through the Consulate-General in Dubai is taking charge of her medical repatriation and she is scheduled to leave for the Philippines on October 26. Lastly, it is the Philippine government through the Philippine Consul-General in Dubai that has financially assisted Ms Alicia in taking care of her repatriation and her hospital expenses as well. We’ve also visited Alicia from the very beginning and we have never failed on that matter.”
This is not an isolated case. Last week, Gulf News reported the plight of a 27-year-old Ethiopian maid lying in coma at the International Modern Hospital waiting to be repatriated to her home country.
Dr Bichu also pointed out that such cases where tourists or family members of blue-collar workers who came without a travel insurance proved to be tricky. “We are bound to help them but need someone to step in now. There are also many cases of underprivileged families, flying in their parents for a holiday and finding their aged parents in similar medical conditions. We want to caution them that there is no arrangement to pay bills and many of those have lost all their life’s savings by paying off hospital bills.”