Elderly not admitted with Cardiomiopathy

I send this mail to Fourways life Hospital, and until today no response. this will happen to other elderly people.

19 January 2019 my Mother drove from Mokopane Limpopo straight to the Fourways Emergency rooms, cause my Father had irregular heartbeats. And struggled to breath. He’s symptoms as was described to the emergency doctor, was that it happens every few minutes. He has been diagnosed with Cardiomyopathy, so the doctor on call did not take his struggling for breath seriously, or gave us a choice to admit him, or put him on oxygen. Instead he was given antibiotics, cough medicine and Pain pills. He was anxious and scared cause he had trouble breathing. So after he was sent home, and immediately had another irregular heartbeat, we phoned the hospital questioning this, which you are more than welcome to double check. We asked for an anxiety pill, cause my Father had a panic attack cause he struggled to breath. Again we gave the hospital a second chance to help us to admit him after we took him back for a second time.

On Sunday 20 January 2019, he rested the whole day, still struggling to breath.

On Monday 21 January 2019, my parents went back home. They arrived in Marble hall. My father took a nap, and half an hour later, my brother had to rush him to the Local GP. Which looked at his lungs which was clear, but his Heart had a fibrillation. And the local doctor immediately phoned for an ambulance to take him to the nearest hospital which was Middelburg. We were concerned that he won’t get the best treatment cause there was no Cardio doctor. And we still can’t understand why they didn’t transport him immediately to fourways hospital cause he was stable when he got to Middelburg, cause the Local doctor gave him a tablet under his tongue to help him to breath and get his heart rhythm down.

I have contacted Fourways hospital and spoke to Kim, and then to Claudia, and in the end a Marthinus Phoned me to ask if there is anything they can do cause I did complain about this situation. Again Fourways life Hospital did not do any efforts to try and transport my Father from Middleburg to forways.

By Friday 25 January 2019, I rushed through to Middelburg cause the nurses from ICU phoned is, cause my Father wanted to get out of Middleburg to his Cardiologist which is Doctor Yip from Fourways Life Hospital, which unfortunately was on leave. By the time I arrived at ICU in Middelburg, I was informed by the nurses that he needs a cardiologist, cause he is not doing well. Although by the time we got an ambulance, the nurses informed me that he will be strong enough to transport, cause he’s heart was stable enough. The ambulance arrived after Marthinus got it approved 9 at night, and by that time, my father struggled to breath and suddenly had to get a ventilator on him. The ambulance did have trouble on the way to Fourways.

He arrived at Fourways early Saturday morning on the 26th of January 2019. And his condition was critical. Kim and Marthinus met with myself and my husband on the 30th of January when we were contacted to come in as my father was critical and busy dying. They were going to give us feedback regarding this matter. But almost a month later, we have not received any communication from them.

If my father was admitted as a heart patient with a diagnosis of Cardiomyopathy, on the 19th of January 2019, we as a family felt we could have had more time with him. Instead he passed away on the 31st of January 2019 at 12:20 at Fourways hospital where he went for help in the first place. We weren’t given the option to admit him. Why would an ER Doctor admit a old man with a heart problem, who struggles to breath, and according to him had a mild flu, when the local GP in Marble hall found that he’s lungs were clear.

I decided to go public with this matter, as there is no contact from Fourways to the family who is still grieving about a grand father, a husband, a father, and a friend to many.

This happens all the time. And people need to know what is happening