A non-governmental organisation headquartered in the UK, Ghana Diaspora Women (GDW), has called for the immediate suspension of the two doctors and nurses involved in the events that led to the death of the wife of the Director of the Ghana Institute of Languages (GIL).

Dr Emmanuel Kuto had said he will seek redress in court as he is being bullied by the hospital so he drops the case of negligence he is pursuing against the management of the facility.

According to Dr Kuto, his wife died at GARH after she had been given a wrong prescription by a doctor while she was on admission.

GDW, reacting to the incident in a statement released on Monday, 6 July 2020, noted that: “There are times when many Ghanaians have raised such concerns about negligence, gross misconduct and malpractices on the part of doctors and nurses in our hospitals in Ghana and no one has taken any actions.”

According to the GDW, “too many lives are lost through gross negligence and enough is now enough. One loss of life, whether rich, middle-class or poor, is one life too many.”

The group, therefore, called on the “Head of Ghana Health Service ... and the Director of Ridge Hospital, Dr Emmanuel Srofenyoh, to immediately suspend the two doctors and nurses involved in this alleged matter, as, we believe, their behaviour was unethical of the medical profession, until investigations are duly completed.”

GDW continued that it “would be supporting Dr Kuto, should he decide to pursue the legal route for some form of reasonable, substantial compensation, as sorry alone, will not be enough in this matter.”

It added that: “This is a matter the Ghanaian Diaspora Community are very interested in seeing through to the end until justice is served for Madam Esther Sosuh, wife of Dr Kuto, the children and the entire family. Also, on behalf of many Ghanaians who have suffered pain at the expense of professionals who were supposed to be concerned for their health.”

Dr Kuto recalled that he heard a conversation between a doctor rebuking his colleague doctor over the phone for prescribing a wrong medication for his deceased wife.

The management of GARH responded by saying that it would conduct an investigation into the events that led to the death of the GIL Director’s wife.

Following a series of meetings with the management of the hospital, Dr Kuto, in a press statement released on Friday, 3 July 2020, noted that: “We were invited by Dr Emmanuel Srofenyoh, the Medical Director of the Greater Accra Regional Hospital (also known as Ridge Hospital) to appear before a committee set up to investigate the circumstances leading to the demise of my wife, Esther Sosuh.”

The parties, after some initial disagreements, agreed that “GARH had failed to officially notify the husband and family of the deceased. GARH had also failed to debrief the husband and family per established protocol. As of the time of the meeting, that had still not been done; there was the need to conduct an autopsy on the body of Esther Sosuh in order to establish the cause of death, to make the findings of the proposed autopsy meaningful to the husband and family of the deceased, it was imperative for GARH to make available to them all relevant documents in respect of Esther Sosuh, from pre-surgery consultations to death.”

Also, “to enable the husband of the deceased, give a meaningful testimony before the investigative committee, it was imperative for GARH to make available to him all relevant documents in respect of Esther Sosuh, from pre-surgery consultations till death”.

It was also agreed that husband of the deceased “should put in a formal written request to GARH to enable it to release the documents to, following the release of the documents, Dr Kuto would pick a coroner’s form and proceed to report the case to the police and would then sign the consent form for the autopsy to proceed.”

The statement continued that subsequently, the husband of the deceased, “submitted the letter requesting the release of the documents to GARH. The Minister of Health, the Director-General of Ghana Health Services and the Regional Director of Ghana Health Services were copied.

“A few hours later, GARH, through its Medical Director, informed Dr Kuto by phone that they had been advised by their lawyers not to release the documents that GARH had undertaken at the meeting. At the same time, the Medical Director wanted Dr Kuto to sign a consent form authorising the autopsy to proceed” to which the latter declined.

Explaining what this meant to him in an interview with Class News, Dr Kuto described the action by the management of GARH as incredible.

He said: “I’ll be meeting my lawyers on Monday. I had wanted us to stay out of court because I really didn’t want to go this way. My priority was to make sure that things change at Ridge Hospital. I told them that what happened doesn’t do them any good at all. Their image has been terribly damaged because the story has gone around the world".

He added that: “I was willing to help them resolve this thing more or less peacefully but now they are on the offensive, so, I have no choice but also go and seek legal redress. Now, we’re totally deadlocked. Yesterday, the Medical Director called me trying to pressure me into signing the forms. When I said no, he said: ‘Oh, you, we know what you’re doing, you are doing delaying tactics and you’re trying to tarnish my reputation. God who is in heaven is watching you’. At this time, all my pent-up emotions simply blew up and I just hang up on him. So, that is where we are now. They’re actually trying to bully me, incredible.”