UGX 567M Lawsuit: Kampala Hospital Doctors Dragged To Court For Alleged Negligence & Patient Abandonment

By Our Reporter 

In a civil suit that casts a harsh spotlight on medical accountability in Uganda, a woman identified as Gloria Namande has filed a comprehensive and detailed claim in the High Court of Uganda against Kampala Hospital Limited and two of its specialist doctors, seeking a total of over UGX 567 million in special damages alone, along with punitive damages and a call for professional disciplinary action.

The suit, registered as Civil Suit No. HCT-00-CV-CS-0384-2025 in the High Court’s Civil Division, alleges that a routine, elective Caesarean section resulted in a devastating, preventable brain injury, followed by a shocking pattern of patient abandonment, medical report falsification, and emotional coercion against the patient’s next of kin.

The defendants named in the plaint are Kampala Hospital Limited (the 1st Defendant); Dr. Namusoke Fatuma, an Obstetrician Gynecologist (the 2nd Defendant); and Dr. Nalwanga Juliet, a Neurosurgeon (the 3rd Defendant).

The Alleged Incident: A Routine Surgery Turns Catastrophic

According to the plaint, Ms. Namande was admitted to Kampala Hospital on November 18, 2023, for a planned elective C-section the following morning. The records confirm she had an uneventful pregnancy and had previously undergone two successful C-section deliveries. She had consented to the procedure being performed under spinal anesthesia and managed by Dr. Namusoke Fatuma.

The crisis allegedly began on the morning of November 19, 2023, inside the operating theatre during the administration of spinal anesthesia by the hospital’s anesthetist, identified only as “James” in the report.

The plaint explicitly claims that the anesthetist “negligently misdirected the spinal needle,” failing to access the subarachnoid space and instead traumatizing vascular structures. This trauma is alleged to have caused arterial bleeding into the spinal canal, which subsequently obstructed cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) outflow, rapidly precipitating acute obstructive hydrocephalus and a severe rise in intracranial pressure.

The Plaintiff immediately reported a “sudden, severe headache,” which the document stresses is a recognized red flag for neuraxial vascular injury.

Allegations of Battery and Breach of Protocol

A central pillar of the suit is the claim of battery and failure to adhere to clinical standards. The plaint alleges that despite Ms. Namande’s immediate and severe symptoms, the surgical team, including “James” and Dr. Fatuma, omitted to halt the procedure or initiate an urgent neurological assessment.

Instead, they allegedly unilaterally converted the procedure to general anesthesia without obtaining informed consent, which the Plaintiff’s lawyers contend was a breach of legal rights and amounted to battery. Furthermore, the surgical team is accused of proceeding despite “unstable anesthetic parameters” and failing to monitor critical levels like oxygen saturation and end-tidal CO2, thereby exposing the Plaintiff to cerebral hypoperfusion.

The document asserts that this “cascade of negligent acts” directly caused Ms. Namande’s resulting catastrophic intraventricular hemorrhage (IVH), which led to the need for emergency neurosurgical intervention and her current permanent neurological disability.

Following the C-section, which concluded around 10:30 a.m., the plaint details an agonizing nine-hour period of alleged patient abandonment and systemic deception.

At 11:00 a.m., Dr. Namusoke Fatuma reportedly told the Plaintiff’s husband (Next of Kin, NOK) that anesthesia complications had occurred and that the Plaintiff had received General Anesthesia, but reassured him she would be returned in about three hours.

However, the suit alleges that the surgical team abandoned the Plaintiff in an unresponsive state from 10:30 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.. The anesthetist, “James,” is accused of filing a false report post-operation, stating the C-section anesthesia was “uneventful,” despite the severe symptoms and ultimate patient outcome (brain bleed). Dr. Fatuma is also accused of deliberate clinical evasion by omitting the complications she verbally mentioned to the family from her official report.

For eight hours, the family’s repeated inquiries were allegedly met with reassurances from hospital staff that the Plaintiff was “merely recovering from anesthesia”. It was only at 7:00 p.m. that the High Dependency Unit (HDU) staff, during the evening shift, finally intervened, and the family was allowed to see the patient, noting her head and neck were swollen.

The ICU team, led by Intensivist Dr. Kabatoro, allegedly had no handover report from the C-section team, prompting them to order a series of investigations, including an urgent CT scan. Throughout this critical period, “James” the anesthetist and Dr. Fatuma were “conspicuously absent,” failing to provide post-operative review or a formal handover.

Late Diagnosis, Coercion, and Withholding of Evidence

The devastating diagnosis was confirmed around 10:30 p.m. when the CT-Scan results were disclosed, revealing catastrophic neurological injuries, including a basal ganglia bleed, IVH, right-sided paralysis, and ventriculomegaly.

Dr. Nalwanga Juliet, the Neurosurgeon (3rd Defendant), was escalated to at this late hour. The plaint accuses her and Dr. Fatuma of a “calculated effort to sanitize the narrative and shield institutional liability” by suddenly appearing to convene a phone call with the NOK to secure consent for an emergency External Ventricular Drain (EVD) procedure.

The Plaintiff’s husband was allegedly met with “emotional coercion,” told in no uncertain terms that the Plaintiff “would be dead within hours” without immediate consent. He reluctantly signed the consent under time pressure and emotional distress.

Crucially, the plaint alleges that Dr. Nalwanga Juliet deliberately withheld information from the NOK: the CT scan had conclusively ruled out any pre-existing conditions, such as an aneurysm, as the cause of the IVH. This omission, the lawyers argue, was a calculated act of concealment designed to obscure the direct causal link between the negligent anesthesia management and the life-threatening injury, thereby protecting institutional interests. This finding was later confirmed by a medical team at Nairobi Hospital, according to the plaint.

The claims of negligence continued into the post-operative period. The Defendants are accused of prematurely commencing physiotherapy while the Plaintiff was neurologically unstable and dependent on an active EVD, a measure which is contraindicated and allegedly worsened her outcome. Furthermore, the EVD itself, a critical device to relieve intracranial pressure, was allegedly allowed to remain non-functional for a period exceeding thirty-six (36) hours.

Ms. Namande is suing for negligence and battery and seeking judgment for:

1. A declaration that the Defendants are jointly and severally liable.
2. UGX 567,440,000 (Uganda Shillings, Five Hundred Sixty-Seven Million Four Hundred Forty Thousand) in special damages.
3. General damages for the injuries, pain, mental anguish, and loss of income.
4. Punitive damages for concealment of facts, malicious obstruction of justice, and abandonment.
5. A formal recommendation for disciplinary proceedings against Dr. Namusoke Fatuma and Dr. Nalwanga Juliet.

The defendants have been formally summoned to file a defence in the High Court within fifteen (15) days of the date of service. This case is expected to generate significant public interest in discussions surrounding clinical standards and patient rights in Uganda’s private healthcare sector.