By: Audrey Raymonda John
Dr Herbert Kallon, a medical doctor, last Friday testified before Justice Alhaji Momoh Jah Steven in the Murder trial of Abdul Kpaka, who was alleged to have killed his girlfriend, Sia Fatu Kamara.
Prosecution Witness Dr. Herbert Kallon, led in evidence by state counsel Yusuf Issac Sesay, said he has been a surgeon and medical doctor for about 11 years now.
He said he is a volunteer at the Connaught Hospital but previously at the Emergency Government Hospital Goderich.
” I worked at the emergency hospital from July 1st to October 1st, 2024. I was there for additional postgraduate surgical training for a period of three months, and my duties then included treating patients in the outpatient department, treating patients admitted to the hospital, performing surgical operations with my supervisor, and conducting procedures on patients admitted and also outpatient,” he explained.
Dr Kallon further recalled 13th August 2024, adding that on that day, while on duty at the Emergency hospital around 8:25 a.m., one of their nurses called him and informed him about an emergency case.
Upon receipt of that information, the witness said he rushed into the critical area at the emergency room where the patient was, and while there, he noticed one international doctor and a team of nurses performing CPR on the deceased (Sia Fatu Kamara).
He said the Cardoe Preliminary Resuscitation involved applying chest compressions by a health care worker to move blood around the body, breathing air into the mouth using an instrument through an airbag, and monitoring the patient and the monitor.
He said the procedure involved giving some drugs to the patient, adding that the CPR procedure involved a lot of healthcare workers.
The reason why he said they conduct CPR was for patients who are brought to the hospital unconscious without heart functioning well, and they immediately conduct CPR to save that patient.
He explained further that when he entered the critical area at the emergency hospital where the patient (deceased) was, he went to where the CPR was conducted, observed the procedure, and also took notes of what was going on.
According to him, one of his supervisors, Dr Claudio, was already in charge of leading the process and said that the CPR continued for about 15 to 20 minutes on his arrival. He said he observed the deceased lying on the bed unconscious without responding to any stimuli, meaning she was motionless and not responding to any voice or the force applied to her chest.
He continued that when he checked the monitor, the deceased’s blood pressure was zero, and there was no pulse. He added that the respiratory rate was zero, and the Electrocardiogram (ECG), which measures the electrical activity of the heart, showed nothing.
During the procedure, he said two medications were applied to the deceased: firstly, Adrenaline medicine, which they give during resuscitation to restart the heart, and Naloxone medicine, which they give to neutralize drugs.
The team that was performing the procedure concluded that the patient did not show any sign of improvement throughout the whole procedure, meaning the patient was brought unconscious with no sign of life.
Throughout the procedure, the witness said the deceased remained unconscious with no sign of life, and in the end, the deceased was confirmed dead.
Dr Claudio and some of the nurses, he said, went to inform the relatives of the deceased while he summarised his findings on the outpatient chart and ended with a diagnosis that the patient was clinically dead and asked the nurses to wrap the deceased and transfer her to the Connaught hospital mortuary since the emergency hospital does not have a mortuary.
According to Dr Kallon, clinically dead is a term used by medical doctors to state that the patient is dead, meaning there were no heart sounds, no breath sounds, the pupils were fixed dilated, and unreactive to light.
The patient (deceased), he said, was never admitted to the Emergency hospital because she was confirmed dead and did not meet the emergency hospital criteria.
The diagnosis chart of Sia Fatu Kamara (now deceased) was shown to the witness, who identified him.
It was produced and tendered marked as exhibit H, respectively, to form part of the court records.
In further evidence, the witness said CPR has some effects, especially when it is being done by someone inexperienced, but when done by a team of experienced healthcare workers, the side effects of the procedure are minimal, he said.
The effects of CPR, according to him, are vomiting, the belly project because of the air that is breathed on the patient, and it also led to rib fractures.
During cross-examination by lawyer Emmanuel Teddy Koroma, the witness confirmed that he has been a medical doctor for 11 years and has a wealth of experience in the medical field.
The witness said he needed to examine a patient before confirming his or her death, and the deceased was no exception.
When asked upon an examination conducted on Sia if she was confirmed dead, the witness said yes, she was.
When further asked if the examination was conducted to ascertain whether the vital signs were present, the witness responded that that was some of the examination conducted on Sia.
The witness continued that the team did a general observation on her to check her vital signs and the electrical activity of the heart, which is not part of the vital signs, ECG, and checked her glass-go-coma scale, which is done to check Sia’s consciousness level.
The witness further revealed that CPR is a life-saving process that involves examination.
When asked that one cannot conduct CPR on a dead person, the witness replied in the affirmative, adding that they did conduct CPR on Sia.
He further told the witness that while examining a dead patient, there were signs they noticed. The witness replied in the affirmative, he concluded.
Meanwhile, Justice Alhaji Momoh Jah Steven adjourned the matter to the 8th of November 2024.