A one-and-a-half-year-old baby had its right hand amputated after it developed severe gangrene.
Mohammed Makir, a pre-term baby, was treated for severe hydrocephalus (a neurological disorder caused by excess cerebrospinal fluid in the brain) when he was five months old. Last week, the shunt inserted to remove the fluid was ejected when the baby passed stools.
The parents, Dastagir Meera and his wife Abdul Azeesa, took their child to the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital. The child underwent a three-and-a-half-hour surgery and was put on intravenous therapy. A day later, the intravenous line was changed from the left arm to the right arm.
“The baby was crying in pain and my wife complained to the nurse, who told her that it was normal as he was in pain. But the baby continued to cry, and the mother alerted the nurses that his fingers were turning black. It was not until the wrist started blackening that the nurses responded,” Mr. Dastagir alleged.
The IV line was removed, and Azeesa was advised to rub ointment to ease pain. “My son used to hold the bottle with both hands when he sipped milk. But he could not raise his right hand and cried. My wife alerted the doctors. By this time the skin of his fingers started peeling,” the father claimed. After the doctors reviewed a scan of the child’s arm, they referred him to the Institute of Child Health (ICH), a unit of RGGGH, as he could need amputation. “The doctors at ICH said that had the child been brought within six hours of the incident, they could have salvaged his arm,” Mr. Dastagir said.
E. Theranirajan, Dean of the RGGGH and the ICH, said the child, a preterm baby that weighed 1.5 kg at birth, had developed hydrocephalus due to intraventricular haemorrhage for which a VP shunt was done. Its milestones were delayed as it developed complications.
After “an extrusion of VP shunt via anus” the child underwent an emergency surgical removal of the shunt tube, and a new shunt was placed five days ago. “In the post-operative period, the child developed an acute thrombotic episode, involving the right arm, and despite emergency appropriate interventions, the thrombosis progressed rapidly, resulting in a non-salvageable limb,” the doctor explained.
On Sunday, a team of doctors performed the amputation and Makir is being monitored in the paediatric intensive care unit at the ICH, he said.
An inquiry committee has been constituted. The report will be submitted to the government, the Dean added.
Makir is the second child of the couple. His older brother is in school in the city. The family, hailing from Thondi town in Ramanathapuram district, relocated to Chennai for Makir’s treatment last year, Mr. Dastagir said, adding: “Those responsible for the loss of limb of my child should be made answerable.”
