The Sunday News
Robin Muchetu Senior Reporter
THE United Bulawayo Hospitals has for over a month stopped all post-mortems as the institution’s only pathologist is on holiday in Cuba. Pathologists carry out post-mortems on bodies to determine the cause of death. In murder cases or death due to negligence and accidents, a post-mortem is a statutory requirement. People who spoke to the Sunday News said they had to bury their relatives without conducting a post-mortem because the pathologist was away.
The only pathologist at the institution is Dr Sanganai Pesanai who is said to be away in Cuba on leave. Dr Pesanai is not the resident pathologist at UBH but is a Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) pathologist. Dr Pesanai has been assisting the hospital since 2005. Dr Pesanai visits the hospital weekly to attend to cases that are before the courts and police cases that need investigation. These cases involve a wide catchment from areas such as Masvingo, Beitbridge and other areas.
Sources within the hospital say there is a backlog already for bodies that need post-mortems and bodies are piling up in the mortuary. One affected family from Bulawayo said they were disturbed by the happenings.
“We lost our relative on Monday last week and when we went to the hospital we were asked if we wanted a post-mortem to which we agreed because we needed to know what killed our relative. That is when we were told it could only be processed when the pathologist returns to work on 15 February,” said one relative.
The bereaved family said they were shocked over the issue, saying they were not able to wait for the pathologist’s return.
The family was told that they could have a post mortem report based on the doctors’ notes that had been done when the patient was alive but they were not satisfied.
“The challenge is that we do not know what killed our relative, we are only basing on what ailment he had when he came to the hospital. The post-mortem was going to give us an accurate and true result of the cause of death,” the family said.
Sources told the Sunday News that by Thursday last week about 15 families that needed a post-mortem were forced to bury their deceased without a post-mortem because of the situation.
Efforts to get a comment from the hospital’s chief executive officer, Mrs Nonhlanhla Ndlovu, were fruitless.
