This baby has a Hole-in-the-heart and needs N3m to live

A handicapped father has  appealed to good -spirited Nigerians   for financial assistance his six-month-old daughter with a hole in the heart.

The  baby boy  is also suffering from a congestive cardiac failure and complex congenital disease in his heart and requires corrective surgery urgently.

Mr Joseph Enechojo Oguche is the father of Narcisse Mary Oguche, is a teacher at the Government Junior Secondary School, Gwarimpa Estate.

Oguche, who is suffering from leukemia, an ailment of excessive white blood cells, consequent upon his treatment at the University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan, he lost his hearing sense and became totally deaf. As a result, he has been subjected to heavy medication and travels to Ife every three months for treatment. The treatment has been taking a huge financial toll on him coupled with the additional pain from his child.

As if that was not enough, he has been shattered by the sudden discovery of a complex congenital disease in the heart of his six months old son. Little Mary was born on July 7, 2014, at the National Hospital, few days later, the boy started breathing fast and was rushed to the Kelina Hospital on August 8, 2014 where it was discovered he was in respiratory distress, tachycardia with tender hepatomegaly; all features of heart disease of heart failure. Echocardiography was done on the baby and a diagnosis of complex congenital heart disease was made and currently on anti-failure medications.

The hospital said the treatment that would be adequate to correct the problem would not be carried out in Nigeria, therefore the need for a trip to India to cure the ailment. But the poor teacher, Oguche who is still struggling to contain his ailment and the wife proceeded to the National Hospital on October 29 for intensive care when the baby was three months old. As the illness intensified and the baby wouldn’t stop crying and writhing in pains, topped with cough, fever, vomiting for two straight days, he was put in the Emergency Paediatric Unit (EPU). The treatment costs the parents N4,000 daily until until workers in the hospital went on strike and the baby had to move to Joy Land Hospital in Gwarimpa. The couple could not cope with the cost of this treatment and had to take the baby home and they live in the agony of the baby’s continued pains, and with the anti-failure medications. Sadly, this little boy’s condition depreciates every day, leaving the family with little hope.

Abuja Metro’s visit to the Oguches home at Gwarimpa to see the boy provided a better understanding of the boy’s predicament and the pains the parents go through in their helpless situation.

Mary’s father, Oguche told Abuja Metro that his son’s crisis started few weeks after he was born. The teacher who could not hear questions asked him had to be communicated in writing, recalled the pains and also called for assistance from the governments and privileged persons to assist him tackle the problem.

However, the three hospitals have referred them to India as he would require surgery as the definitive treatment. The surgery would be done in two stages; the first stage would be done now while the second stage would be done when he is four years of age. The estimated cost for the initial procedure in India is $10,000. In the father’s word, “they referred us to India, but the amount I was asked to pay is too much for me, I am here to appeal to The Sun Newspaper to help me reach out to people to come to my aid financially.”

With a shaky voice, he explained how much the treatment has drilled him. “When he was on admission at the National Hospital, everyday, we paid N4000 for oxygen, excluding drugs or other things. Then, after he left the National Hospital when the workers commenced strike, the ailment got worse and we had to take him to his doctor’s hospital, there again, he was admitted and for everyday, the bill was N25000. We spent a week and a day there and he was discharged two days before Christmas. I have not even offset the entire bill at the second hospital. Even now, although the symptoms never cleared, but only God’s intervention would stop another major crisis of serious breakdown. That is why am appealing that people should come to my aid as soon as possible, so that the surgery will be done and he will have a normal life.”

In a move to save master Mary, from the life threatening ailment, Dr. Muhammed-Bukoye and Dr I. B Babay, a Consultant Paediatrician in Kelina Hospital, and Chief Consultant Cardiologist in National Hospital, respectively, under whom he was admitted, had both written reference letters stating the baby’s diagnosis and quick action required.

In the face of all odds, Oguches rely on the tremendous good will of the public to get their baby off the hook of heart failure. A breakdown of the bill for Mary’s treatment as given by the hospitals authorities is about N3m, including the cost of treatment, air fare to and fro India with mother, accommodation, feeding, and other sundry expenses.

At the Oguches’family home, the mother of the ailing baby while sheding tears said: “Every day, I am scared because his condition gets worse, he coughs all the time, he keeps breathing fast. When I go out, I have to cover him very well, because people keep asking me, if I do feed him. I once took him to a barber and he refused to cut his hair because of his appearance – all the veins and nerves in his head are out. What scares me the most is that the doctor said he won’t grow until the surgery is done, and that the surgery has to be done fast because there is a point he will get to, the surgery can’t be done. He is almost seven months and cannot sit. It is not easy for me because of his condition.  I don’t go out, except to the church where I lay him and pray my heart out.  I have to stay with him, I can’t even go on with the little work I do. Everyday I pray that people will help me and help my baby survive.

I beg that your financial assistance be made into my bank account at ECO BANK, Oguche Enechojo Joseph, account number 2202091999.”

Written By EVANGELINE ANUMBA