In Sia Alleged Murder Trial: Doctor says effect of CPR may Lead to “Fractured Ribs”

By Feima Sesay

Dr. Herbert Kallon who happens to be the 7th Prosecution Witness in the ongoing murder trail of Sia Fatu Kamara has revealed that some of the effect of Cardoe Preliminary Resuscitation (CPR) can lead to ribs Fractured if done by inexperienced medical worker.

He said these during his testimony on Friday, 1st November 2024 , before Justice Alhaji Momoh Jah Stevens presiding over the matter.

Led in evidence by state Lawyer Yusuf Issac Sesay, he said he is a surgeon medical doctor and has worked for about 11 years now.

He said he is currently attached to the Connaught hospital but previously worked at the Emergency Government Hospital Goderich.
” I worked at the emergency hospital from the 1st July to 1st October 2024, i was there for additional post graduate surgical training for a period of 3 months and my duties then includes, treating patient at the outpatient department, treating patient admitted at the hospital, performed sugercal operations with my supervisor and conduct procedures on patient admitted and also outpatient”, he explained.

Dr Kallon further recalled 13th August 2024, that on that day while on duty at the Emergency hospital , at around 8:am, one of their nurses called him and informed him about an emergency case around 8:25 am.

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).

The Cardoe Preliminary Resuscitation he said involves application of chest compressions by a health care worker to move blood around the body, breathing of air into the mouth .

He said this is done using instrument into the mouth through an air bag, and monitoring of the patient and the monitor.

He said the procedure also involved giving some drugs to the patient, adding that the CPR procedure involves a lot of healthcare workers.

He said they conduct CPR to save the life of patients who are brought to the hospital unconscious without the 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 to observe 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, noting that on his arrival the CPR continued for about 15 to 20 minutes.

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, neither the force applied to her chest.

He continued that when he checked the monitor , the deceased blood pressure was zero, and there was no pulse.

According to him, the respiratory rate was zero, and the Electro Cardeo Gram(ECG) which was to measure the electrical activity of the heart shows nothing .

During the procedure, he said , two medications were applied on the deceased, namely ; Adrenaline medicine which they give during resuscitation to restart the heart and Naloxone medicine which they give to nuetrilized drugs.

The team that was performing the procedure according to the witness concluded that the patient did not show any sign of improvement throughout the whole procedure .

That means , the patient was brought unconscious with no sign of life.
Throughout the procedure, the witness said the deceased remain unconscious with no sign of life and at the end the deceased was confirmed dead.

Dr Claudio and some of the nurses he said went to inform the relatives of the deceased . He mentioned that he summarized his findings on the outpatient chart and ended with a diagnosis that the patient was clinically dead and asked the nurses to wrapped the deceased and transferred 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 . That there were no heart sound, no breath sound, the pupils(black spot on the eyes )was fixed dilated and unreactive to light.

The patient (deceased) he said was never admitted at the Emergency hospital because she was confirmed dead and didn’t meet the emergency hospital criteria .

The diagnosis chart of Sia Fatu Kamara (now deceased) was shown to the witness which he identified.

It was produced and tendered marked as exhibit H respectively to form part of the court records.

In further evidence, the witness said the CPR has some effects especially when it is being done by someone inexperienced person but when done by a team of expirence health care workers, the side effects of the procedure he said , is very minimal.

The effects of CPR according to him includes, vomiting, the belly project because of the air that is breath in the patient and it also leads to ribs fractures.

During cross examination of the witness by lawyer Emmanuel Teddy Koroma lead defense lawyer for Abdul Kpaka, he confirmed that he has been a medical doctor for 11 years and has wealth of expirence when it comes to the medical field.

The witness said he needs to examined a patient before confirming him or her dead and the deceased was no exceptions.

When asked that upon examination conducted on Sia, if she was confirmed dead, the witness said yes she was.

When he was further questions that the examination was conducted to ascertain whether the vital signs were present, the witness in response said yes that was some of the examination conducted on Sia.

The witness continued that the team did a general observation on her, to check for 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 was done to check the conscious level of the deceased.

The witness further revealed that CPR is a life saving process that involves examination.

When asked that one cannot conduct a CPR on dead person, the witness replied in the afirmative, adding that they did conduct CPR on Sia.

Lawyer Koroma further put it to the witness that while examining a patient who is dead, there are no signs noticed , the witness replied in the afirmative.

At this stage , the Court adjourned the case to Friday 8 November 2024 while the accused was remanded in prison.