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MAMA-KANGAROO 001
What year did you give birth? 2004. In which town and hospital? Belgrade, Zvezdara City Hospital Did anything unpleasant happen to you in the hospital? What? Did anybody insult you? How? When I was brought to the intensive care unit after C-section, I was delirious and had problems waking up and regaining normal breathing. While struggling with that, I did not remember to use a sanitary pad and I bled on the sheets. When I came to my senses, a nurse yelled at me for staining the sheets and she refused to replace them. When I complained to the chief of intensive care unit the day after, I got the following answer (quote): "Don’t mess with my Slobce! She is the hardest-working one here! Be sure that I will tell her this." The message is clear: do not complain, keep silent and suffer or you will make it even worse. How were you addressed in the hospital? By your name and last name, or some nicknames? Which ones? - Only the anaesthesiologist (whom I, by the way, bribed for epidural) addressed me by name - Section from the Room 8 - Educated one - Mother Were there any problems with the accommodation or with the medical equipment? What sort of problems? Air conditioner fell off the delivery room wall in the midst of my delivery. Luckily I wasn’t beneath it. I wonder what would happen if I was? The beds we slept on in the intensive care were set in a semi-sitting position. When I asked a nurse to put them in horizontal position so that we could sleep, she said (quote): ”No can do. We were donated this shit by the Americans and as soon as we received it, it broke down.” After two nights of semi-seated sleeping, my anaesthesiologist revealed us a secret: when plugged in, the beds work perfectly and can be adjusted to all possible positions, horizontal included. There were no pillows in the intensive care unit. We were explained that the hospital protocol did not allow them. Chairs in the Baby Friendly ward were not allowed by hospital protocol, as I was told, although it is much easier to breastfeed while sitting in a chair than on a bed without back posts. When did you see your child for the first time after giving birth? How often did you see him/her? Could you see him/her whenever you wanted? My baby was brought for me to see while I was not yet completely woken up from anaesthesia, so I didn’t even see him properly. Moreover, they did not allow me to touch him. As the hospital protocol prescribes 3 days of intensive care after C-section and babies are not allowed at the ICU, I saw my child only one more time for two or three minutes, since I cried constantly for three days and they were afraid I was having a nervous breakdown. I was not allowed to touch or breastfeed him. Only when I was transferred to the Baby Friendly ward after four days I was able to touch my child for the first time. When did you breastfeed your baby for the first time? Were there any problems with breastfeeding? What sort of problems? Only on the fourth day, since he was not with me before that. I had to spend three days at the ICU after C-section, as the hospital protocol prescribes 3 days of intensive care after C-section and babies are not allowed at the ICU. Of course I had problems with breastfeeding. No-one came to the ICU to instruct me in breast compression and my breasts were completely blocked by the fourth day. I had to bribe a nurse to fix my breasts, before I could even start normally breastfeeding my baby. Because of the wounds which opened on my nipples, breastfeeding was extremely painful for me and the staff refused to feed baby a supplement when I couldn’t endure breastfeeding with such wounds. Did you ever happen to doubt the expertise of the doctors and other medical staff? When and why? It would never be clear to me why I, as a 37-years old primipara of small build before childbirth (44.5kg), whose baby was bigger than average (3,800) and who was told by private obgyn who monitored my pregnancy that baby had not placed his head in a completely proper position one day before childbirth wasn’t - immediately sent to C-section, but the doctors insisted on natural childbirth accompanied by induction first, which ended in urgent C-section anyway. I question her decision, since it is contrary to everything I have ever read about deliveries. I’ve been thinking now: had she sent me to C section immediately maybe she wouldn’t have had any basis to send me to anaesthesiologist for epidural anaesthesia, and he wouldn’t have any basis to charge me €250 which he put in his pocket. While I was being intubated under total anaesthesia, the anaesthesiologist knocked out my tooth. Maybe it had to be done that way – I don’t know. But I would like to know why it wasn’t mentioned on the discharge list at all, or why I wasn’t informed whether I was possibly entitled to compensation of dental prosthetic costs by the hospital? If I am not entitled, then why I am not entitled? Thirteen days after delivery I contracted chicken pox. Two days after first blister broke out I spoke to 5 health workers: a) employees of the “Hello Baby” service; b) general practitioner; c) paediatrician; d) infectious diseases specialist; e) gynaecologist. None of them told me that I had to take my baby to Infective Diseases Clinic within 72 hours from the moment of appearance of the first blister, to be administered short-term protection from chicken pox. I only found that info on the Internet on the fourth day, but it was already too late. So my baby contracted chicken pox 25 days after his birth – completely unnecessary. I question doctors’ general knowledge about general matters, especially the knowledge of infectious diseases specialist and paediatrician with whom I spoke and who had to know this. Did you ever doubt whether some of the hospital protocols and rules were justified? Which ones? Why? How would you change them? After it became clear that natural delivery was not going to work and that C-section was inevitable, they stopped administering me epidural anaesthetic in the delivery room. More than 20 minutes passed before they took me to surgery and, as I was being administered induction before being given total anaesthesia, the pain was excruciating. Isn’t it possible to take woman in labour to the surgery first and then to take her off one anaesthesia and administer another in order to reduce her suffering? It would never be clear to me why three days of intensive care are needed after C section? If it is necessary indeed (and I am sure it is not), the protocol must not prohibit mother from seeing her child during that time! The first night after the delivery a nurse refused to give me a sleeping gown, saying that hospital protocol prescribes that a woman had to sleep naked the first night. I will always wonder why? I froze by the broken window, since it all happened before the heating season started. Food and drink were not allowed during the three days at the ICU, which is a complete nonsense. You have to be administered saline and wear urinary catheter all the time. When I insisted on being sure that I could control my urinating even without a catheter, I was told that this was not the point. You wear a catheter so that the quantity of fluid discharged from your organism can be measured. Is there any other way for doing that? The Baby Friendly ward protocol prescribes supplemental feeding of babies at noon and at midnight. It is impossible to feed a hungry child between these two times. Why? Baby cannot be hungry when you tell him/her to be, but only when he/she is actually hungry. Supplemental feeding has to be an option at any moment. Did you have to bribe anyone? If yes, whom (you can state just his/her title, without a name)? What for? How much? Epidural anaesthesia officially cost me 10,000 dinars, as an additional service not covered by health insurance which has to be specially paid to the hospital gyro account. Besides that, I had to secretly pay anaesthesiologist another €250. If she doesn’t do that, a woman in labour has no chance of getting epidural during childbirth even though she paid 10,000 dinars to the hospital gyro account. Fixing of blocked breasts, because I was not allowed to breastfeed my baby for three days, was performed on me by a nurse working in that hospital, but only after I put €10 in her pocket. Before that, it never crossed anyone’s mind that it should be done. That service has to be “ordered” as it is not prescribed by doctors and staff. Do you have any other impressions or comments that you consider important? At the Institute for Mother and Child, where I did amniocentesis in the fourth month of my pregnancy, cockroaches strolled around on the floor and walls, there were no curtains on the windows and a construction yard was located right across the street so the workers had a whole-day show to watch, more interesting than any TV programme. At the Institute for Mother and Child, the procedure for the amniocentesis appointment is the following: a pregnant woman first comes to schedule the appointment date and time and then she has to come again on the set date at the set time to schedule amniocentesis time and date. Could it not be simpler, with less coming and queuing, especially if a woman is nauseous during the first months of pregnancy? The Institute for Mother and Child protocol requires that a pregnant woman has to stay three days in the hospital after performed amniocentesis. Why? Common world practice is to keep woman half an hour or so and to release her home after that time. It seems that certain quota of overnight stays in hospital has to be fulfilled so that health workers could receive their salaries. Brochure advertising delivery at the maternity ward promises the possibility of making many choices, among which are those whether you wanted enema and shaving before delivery or not. This exists only in the brochure. There is no possibility of choice in real life. When I contracted chicken pox 13 days after the delivery I followed doctor’s advice and called the maternity ward to warn them to sterilise all the places I’ve been to, including the surgery. The switchboard transferred my call to Head Nurse’s extension. Nobody answered and my call was returned to the switchboard. I explained why I was calling and got transferred to the maternity ward. The nurse, who picked up the phone, when I told her why I was calling, replied: "Call the Head Nurse." I couldn’t believe my ears! "Listen, I have chicken pox and small baby, I’m calling you to do you a favour and you tell me to call again! You know what? If you want you can write down my data and inform whoever you need to inform – please be my guest. If not- I will not call again!" Only then was she kind enough to write down my data and inform the hospital authorities.
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STORIES FROM MATERNITY WARDS Mama-Kangaroo 002
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