RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Scores of peo­ple lined up out­side the On­col­o­gy De­part­ment of the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal yes­ter­day af­ter a rat snake slith­ered in­side the fa­cil­i­ty giv­ing both pa­tients and staff a good scare.

But by the time the Forestry Di­vi­sion ar­rived, the snake was nowhere to be seen.

From 7 am to 11 am, pa­tients stood out­side wait­ing to get chemother­a­py. Many of them were el­der­ly can­cer pa­tients. Those who need­ed pre­scrip­tions for can­cer drugs al­so had to wait. 

When Guardian Me­dia ar­rived at the scene, many of the pa­tients ex­pressed frus­tra­tion.

Judy Bernard said, “I heard there is a rat snake and if the staff in there, I don’t see why the pa­tients couldn’t go in. I’m tired, it’s two-three hours I’m stand­ing out here. I have been out since 7 o’ clock,” she said.

An­oth­er pa­tient Car­ol Nag­napen said she did not see what all the fuss was about.

“They say a snake in the build­ing there, so they are not see­ing any pa­tients just yet,” Nag­napen said.

She added, “I came here at half-past eight this morn­ing but there are oth­er peo­ple who wait­ing since sev­en. They are not see­ing any chemother­a­py pa­tients. Once it’s chemo, noth­ing is be­ing done. You get­ting through with a pre­scrip­tion but noth­ing else.”

An el­der­ly woman, who was stand­ing, said she did not know what was go­ing on.

“They did not tell me any­thing. I am wait­ing for a few hours now. They just leave us out here and we wait­ing,” she whis­pered.

She said he had a lit­tle headache af­ter the long wait but she had no choice but to wait.

A source at the fa­cil­i­ty said the snake was nev­er found, but full ser­vices re­sumed at 11 am af­ter the Forestry Di­vi­sion de­clared the fa­cil­i­ty safe for oc­cu­pa­tion. 

Con­tact­ed for com­ment, com­mu­ni­ca­tions man­ag­er at the SWRHA Kevon Ger­vais said while there has been no sub­stan­ti­a­tion re­port of the rep­tile, SWRHA ac­knowl­edges there was a de­layed cus­tomer ex­pe­ri­ence at the On­col­o­gy De­part­ment.

Ger­vais said, “As a mat­ter of ex­treme cau­tion, a cross-func­tion­al team, in­clud­ing Hos­pi­tal Ad­min­is­tra­tion and HSE at­tend­ed. Fol­low­ing the ex­ten­sive search, pa­tients with ap­point­ments were swift­ly processed.”