Mother demands surgery for baby - Woman wants huge cysts removed from 10-month-old

A Kingston mother has grown restive of the runaround she has been receiving from doctors at the Bustamante Hospital for Children who have many times delayed a surgery to remove multiple cysts growing in and around her 10-month-old daughter's liver.

Pamela Johnson told THE STAR that she fears the surgery to remove the cysts that have left a gigantic ball in her daughter Abigayle Willis' stomach may never happen.

"Every time dem say dem a go prepare her for surgery, something come up and dem say it have to put off," Johnson said.

Johnson said she realised that Abigayle had a cyst when she was five months pregnant.

"At about five months, I did a second ultrasound to check on the organs, and they said that there was a cyst there," Johnson recalled.

But when Abigayle was born, the doctors who delivered her at the University Hospital of the West Indies said that she was normal and that there were no signs of a cyst.

"But mi still never comfortable because the baby had some yellowish ting in her eye. When mi tek har to the clinic the doctor say that something is wrong with the liver," Johnson said.

The doctors at the Bustamante Hospital for Children confirmed that Abigayle had a cyst that was pressing on her liver, but told Johnson not to worry because the problem could be corrected.

Problem growing

However, it seems the delay to surgically remove the cysts has caused the problem to exacerbate, as the cysts have started to grow in the liver.

"Now they are saying that cysts gone in the liver and it will be difficult for them to go into it to get it out," Johnson said. "And it reach di point where she might have to do liver transplant."

The public relations officer at the South East Regional Health Authority, which is responsible for the Bustamante Hospital for Children, Taneisha Lewis, told THE STAR that she will investigate why the surgery has been delayed.