A young girl in Dak Lak Province in Vietnam’s Central Highlands has had her leg amputated thanks to the negligence of doctors and nurses at a local hospital.

Nguyen Van Tam, director of a general hospital in Cu Kuin District, affirmed on Monday afternoon that the lack of responsibility and professional knowledge of his subordinates had resulted in Le Thi Ha Vi, a 15-year-old high school student, losing one of her legs.

On March 6, Vi was injured in a road accident after school and taken to the infirmary for treatment.

According to doctors’ diagnosis, the tibia of Vi’s right leg was broken and she was thus treated with a plaster cast.

The young girl then said that she was suffering pain in her wounded leg, but the practitioners refused to remove the cast.

On March 10, the deputy director of the hospital ordered that Vi’s cast be cut through for an examination and discovered that her right leg was seriously swollen, with multiple blisters seen across the limb.

As her condition worsened, the girl’s family asked for her to be transferred to a bigger infirmary in the province, which was turned down by the doctors.

Vi’s family went against the clinicians’ decision and took her to Dak Lak General Hospital one day later, where doctors concluded that her leg had been necrotic.

The schoolgirl underwent another hospital transfer and was forced to have her leg amputated at Cho Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, lest she should die.  

Managers of the hospital in Cu Kuin District have offered VND20 million (US$897.2) in initial support to deal with the consequence, hospital director Tam was quoted by newswire Dan Tri as saying.

The doctor added that staff members at his hospital were terribly sorry for the tragic outcome.

According to the girl’s family, Vi is a good daughter and student who wishes to become a police officer in the future.

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