A three-year-old girl shocked her parents after she woke up during her funeral after doctors declared her dead, only to actually die three hours later at the same hospital. Camila Roxana Martinez Mendoza was admitted to a hospital in the central Mexican state of San Luis Potosí where doctors mistakenly declared that she had died of dehydration.
Her family had just started her funeral viewing when the girl woke up, leaving everyone both shocked and surprised. However, three hours later she finally died. Martinez's family is now accusing the Salinas de Hidalgo Basic Community Hospital of negligence after reportedly declaring the toddler dead too soon.
Medical Negligence
According to the Mexican daily El Universal, Martinez was experiencing stomach pain, vomiting, and fever when Mary Jane Mendoza and her husband took their child to a pediatrician in the town of Villa de Ramos on August 17. Doctors found the situation was too delicate to be managed in a clinic and recommended the child be taken to the hospital for treatment of dehydration.
Martinez's little body was wrapped in a cold towel by the doctors at Salinas de Hidalgo Basic Community Hospital, who also put a pulse oximeter on one of her fingers to monitor her oxygen saturation levels.
After an hour, Martinez was released and given medication. However, her condition worsened later in the day, so she went to a clinic to see a doctor who gave her a different prescription and advised her to eat fruits that are not sweet and drink a lot of water.
That, however, didn't help much as the toddler kept vomiting in spite of the medicine and instructions from the doctors. Her concerned parents took her to another doctor, who advised that she be rushed to the emergency department right away.
Between 9 and 10 p.m., Martinez was readmitted to Salinas, where medical professionals worked to treat the young patient. A little after that she reportedly became unresponsive.
"They wanted to give her (intravenous therapy). They took a long time to put oxygen on her," Mendoza recalled. "They didn't put it on her because they couldn't find her little veins, finally a nurse managed it."
The little girl's IV was removed after about 10 minutes, and she was then brought away to rest. The devastated mother recalled, "She still was hugging me, they took her away and told me, 'You have to let her rest in peace.'"
Double Shock
Strangely, hospital authorities then sent away Mendoza and kept her away from seeing her ailing daughter. She managed to escape from the locked room but she was still unable to enter the room where her daughter was being kept. Sometime later, doctors confirmed that Martinez had died due to dehydration.
Mendoza spotted the coffin's glass window fogging up during the funeral viewing that was held for the cherished toddler the following day.
The next day, August 18, friends and family were readying for her funeral viewing. While they were standing over her tiny casket a few, including the child's mother observed that the coffin's glass window was fogging up.
The grieving mother was advised not to open the coffin by other mourners, who assumed she was having hallucinations. However, Martinez's paternal grandmother reportedly hurried to get a closer look reportedly after she saw her eyes moving and then realized that she had a pulse.
Seeing her condition deteriorate, her family immediately once again rushed her by ambulance to Salinas de Hidalgo Basic Community Hospital, where doctors treated her before declaring her dead from a cerebral edema (brain swelling).
"That was really where my baby was done. We are devastated because my girl was a very happy person, she got along with everyone, she didn't single anyone out," Mendoza said. "We have many people on the ranch who support us because she was cherished."
Mendoza claimed that her daughter was supposed to go to kindergarten this week for the first time.
"What I really want is for justice to be served. I have no grudge against the doctors went to extreme (measures)," she said. "I only ask that the doctors, nurses and directors be changed, so that it does not happen again."
The distraught parents were given two death certificates, the first of which listed dehydration. The second death certificate cites cerebral edema, and metabolic failure as Martnez's causes of death.
Police have launched an investigation but no arrests have been made yet. Also, no charges have been brought against the hospital or doctors yet.
