Inspiration
All is not lost for accident victims like Esther
By Winnie Osika
Unable to walk after an accident, Esther Nasimiyu, 26, was admitted almost immediately upon arrival at the AIC Cure Kijabe Hospital.
She had not walked for about six weeks. She was also not able to pass urine normally and had a urethral catheter( a tube in her urethra) inserted to allow urination.
Esther was knocked down by a moving Public Service Vehicle( PSV) in Kware, Nairobi last May. She was hit from the back by a matatu which was on the“ wrong side” of the road.
From the intervention of the passengers in the matatu, the driver of the PSV and the conductor were prompted to take Esther to hospital, but they instead took her to a chemist that was nearby and left her there, never to return again.
“ After they realised the situation I was in was worse than they had thought, the driver and the conductor told the person at the chemist that they were going to sort out a few things and come back, but they never returned. I could not even move my legs and my whole body was in pain,” says Esther.
After being examined by the pharmacist, she was advised to go to hospital since her condition needed the attention of a doctor.
Speaking to Health Business, Esther’ s aunt, Sarah Nasimiyu says that they then took her to Mama Lucy Hospital and later referred to Kenyatta National Hospital( KNH). She could only move round by the aid of a wheelchair, which was donated to them.
Esther was discharged from KNH only for her condition to worsen while at home. She was then taken to Kikuyu Hospital for further treatment.
Cases of hit and run in Kenya have become rampant leading to numerous deaths and disabilities, thus posing an economic burden to victims and the country as whole.
The economic burden of disabilities caused by road accidents cannot be overemphasized. Ms Nasimiyu, for instance, lost his job as a househelp – as she cannot move around well anymore, like she used to.
The national referral hospital, KNH which admits the highest number of road traffic accidents( RTA) victims has been strained under this burden.
The hospital admits at least 20 accident victims daily. Three quotas of this is as a result of road traffic accidents and at least five as a result of motor cycle accidents. This brings the total number of accident victims to at least 600 monthly, a number that the hospital says it cannot sustain economically.
The KNH has four dedicated wards for RTA victims. Each ward contains six rooms with a bed capacity of 192.
Road accidents are the single largest causes of disability in the country according to the Kenya National Survey of Persons with Disabilities- 2008. The survey also reveals that 4.6 per cent of Kenyans experience some form of disability.
Statistics from the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics( KNBS) Statistical Abstract 2015 show that over the past
60 November-December 2016