A patient has been left traumatised, dependent on sleeping pills, after she and three nurses were attacked by another patient wielding his drip stand.
Hazel Moeti was admitted to Mediclinic Brits on 23 December, after losing her sense of smell, and coughing, with chest pains, reports News24.
"I was alone in the ward, after the other patients had been discharged, when suddenly this man stormed in, attached to a drip stand.”
She said she asked if she could help him, “as it was a women’s ward”. He ignored her and headed for the bathroom, then started banging on the door with his drip stand.
When a nurse entered the room, the man then tried to attack them.
“The nurse had to drag me from my bed. It was hard to run because I could not breathe. When I fell outside the door, he tried to bash us with the drip stand.”
Another two nurses came to their help, she said, adding that the security guards didn’t do anything.
“We ran to another ward, but he came after us. When we tried to close the doors, he pushed his drip stand through the door. At that point, I don’t know what happened; I just switched off. The next moment I was on a bed. They [the nurses] told me they had called his family.”
Moeti spent two more nights in the hospital but was unable to sleep. She said the hospital sent her a psychologist that she had to pay for, to help her deal with the trauma.
“I don’t think she did much because since being discharged on 28 December, I can’t sleep without sleeping pills.”
The hospital had never taken responsibility for the incident or responded to a letter she had sent them, she said.
Mediclinic chief clinical officer Gerrit de Villiers told News24 they were “aware of the incident”.
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