The Selayang General Hospital explained today that it did not ward dengue haemorrhagic fever (DHF) patient Mohamad Rizuan Abdul Aziz last week because his condition then "did not warrant admission".

Dr Siti Rubiah of the hospital's emergency department said that "from our assessment of Rizuan's condition o­n his two visits, there was no necessity to admit him".

Contacted by malaysiakini o­n the case which the DAP had taken up, Siti explained that o­n his second visit to the hospital o­n Feb 19, Rizuan's blood count was 63.

Although it had dropped from 73 o­n the first visit the previous day, she said that a criterion for admission o­n dengue cases was 50 or lower.

"Blood count is o­nly o­ne of the criteria (for admission), other criteria include the overall condition of the patient," she added.

Blood count drops

Rizuan was eventually warded at the Kuala Lumpur General Hospital o­n the afternoon of Feb 19 as a 'wheelchair' case by which time his blood count had dropped to 39.

"If he came back to the hospital the third time with a 39 blood count, we would have warded him as what the Kuala Lumpur GH did," Siti said, adding that the normal human blood count is around 200.

Rizuan was discharged o­n Saturday (Feb 22) after his blood count returned to the normal average. He could not be reached for comment today.

Rizuan's employer, Lim Wai Ming - owner of an electrical equipments shop near Batu Caves - however commented that the Selayang GH was being unreasonable for not admitting Rizuan who is a confirmed DHF patient and whose blood count was dropping.

"His blood count had dropped to 39 the next morning during a blood test at a government clinic," Lim said when contacted.

Unreasonable action

"When he went back to Selayang GH and asked for admission with the medical report from the clinic, the hospital rejected him after they carried out another blood count which turned out to be 63.

"I could see that he was really sick. He was red all over his face and body, so I sent him to the Kuala Lumpur GH the same afternoon where he was immediately warded," she said.

"DHF is very dangerous and can cause death. Even if Rizuan's blood count was not lower than 50, it was steadily dropping and should be warded. I don't understand. The hospital is being unreasonable," Lim lamented.

Meanwhile, DAP national publicity secretary Ronnie Liu blasted the Selayang hospital for rejecting a patient whose condition was deteriorating.

"I would really like to know how the '50 blood count or lower' benchmark was established for admission," he said when contacted.

Liu claimed Rizuan's case is not a o­ne-off issue and that there are others facing the same predicament, but he did not manage to obtain their particulars and contact numbers.

He called for the Health Ministry to instruct all government hospitals to ward all dengue patients and declare a nationwide alert o­n the dengue outbreak immediately.