23rd January, 2018
Jethro Ibileke/Benin
Two medical doctors working with the University of Benin Teaching Hospital (UBTH) have died in the Intensive Care Unit of the Hospital in the last two weeks.
One of the deceased, Dr. Ehidiamen Oaikhena, was said to have been shot by gunmen suspected to be highway robbers at Okada town, in Ovia North-East Local Government Area of Edo State, on January 16, while he was on his way back to Benin.
The name of the other doctor who also died at the Intensive Care Unit of the Hospital a few days earlier, could not be ascertained at the time of filing report.
It was gathered that the 34-year old Oaikhena was returning from a hospital at Okada, where he had conducted a successful surgery when he ran into an ambush by the suspected robbers, around Ovia River.
Reports had it that amidst the pandemonium, the deceased, a senior Registrar in the Department of Anaesthesiology, attempted to reverse his vehicle in a bid to avoid the gunmen, when he was sighted by the armed men, who fired bullets at his vehicle.
A source at the UBTH who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Ehidiamen died five days after he was shot, at the Intensive Care Unit of the Hospital.
The source explained, “As he [Oaikhena] saw the gunmen, he reversed with speed and they [gunmen] thought he was a security personnel. So, they fired shots at his vehicle.
“The bullets penetrated the door of the car and hit him in the stomach. He was still driving with the bullet wounds but he later became weak. He called his wife, who is also a doctor, and she mobilised for an ambulance from the UBTH to the ICU. He spent five days at the ICU before he died.”
Other sources said that colleagues at the Hospital freely donated their blood to the deceased during the operation, hoping that he could be saved.
The Public Relations Officer of the hospital, Mr. Joshua Uwaila, who confirmed the death of the said, “We lost a doctor in the Anaesthetics Department. But I do not have information concerning the cause of [his] death. It is bad enough for us that we lost a very young and bright doctor.”