Top-notch' care eludes Afghan hospital

Nation & World News

The CDC was repeatedly alarmed at medical conditions at Rabia Balkhi Hospital, which was home to a U.S. medical training program.

At the grand re-opening of Rabia Balkhi Hospital in April 2003, then U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson announced: "Today is a new day in Afghanistan, where we now have a new hospital for women to receive top-notch health care..." Dr. Pamela Hyde was the first ob/gyn assigned by HHS to train at the hospital. She took this photo. She and others found the reality inside the hospital starkly different.

Dr. Jeff Whittall, a pediatrician, teaches neonatal resuscitation at Rabia Balkhi Hospital in the summer of 2006. Whittall said he tried to improve care in the hospital's nursery. "We had between five and 20 babies at a time. I must admit that newborn deaths were commonplace, and thus staff thought nothing of having three babies in a crib and two corpses on a steel rack on the bottom of the crib," he said, noting he thought they were doing the best they could under the circumstances.

To honor the U.S. government's commitment to Rabia Balkhi Hospital, Afghan staff installed a plaque naming one wing after First Lady Laura Bush. U.S. officials, however, said they were never consulted and told the hospital to cover it. Dr. Jeanette Akhter, an ob/gyn who taught at the hospital from Nov. 2004-Feb. 2005, lifted up a wipe board to reveal the plaque.

Women in the labor ward at Rabia Balkhi Hospital in December 2004. Dr. Jean Amoura, a visiting ob/gyn from the University of Nebraska Medical Center, took this photo.

Rabia Balkhi Hospital is located in a congested bazaar in downtown Kabul. When the Taliban barred women from receiving care in general hospitals in 1997, it became Kabul's only women's hospital. Dr. Jean Amoura, an ob/gyn from the University of Nebraska Medical Center, took this photo in December 2004 during a brief visit as part of a continuing education program that was separate from the U.S. training project.

A premature baby's face is entirely covered by an adult-sized oxygen mask at Rabia Balkhi Hospital in February 2005. The baby died later that day, said Donna Harris, a nursing consultant from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, who provided the photo. Afghanistan has one of the highest child death rates in the world. The hospital has often lacked key medical supplies and equipment.

Dr. Naseem Rashid, center, teaches the hospital's doctors how to track and monitor a woman's labor in the summer of 2005. Rashid, who provided this photograph, taught as part of the U.S. training program at the hospital from July-September 2005 and again in March 2006. "There was no continuity in the program. There was no team approach. There were no defined goals," she said.

Dr. Naseem Rashid, wearing the white cap and mask, assists in removing a uterine tumor from a woman at Rabia Balkhi Hospital in August 2005. "There was no infection control. It was shocking the first day I entered the operating theater," she said. "You can't blame them. They had no money and nobody to help them." Rashid, who provided this photograph, taught as part of the U.S. training program at the hospital from July-September 2005 and again in March 2006.

Instruments are sterilized in buckets in the delivery room at Rabia Balkhi Hospital in February 2005. Donna Harris, a nursing consultant from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee who took the photo, said she was troubled that during her visit the hospital still lacked good infection control, there was no soap and water in the delivery room and staff often failed to take basic vital signs.

Dr. Naseem Rashid, an ob/gyn, stands by the dedication plaque outside Rabia Balkhi Hospital. Rashid, who provided this photograph, taught in the U.S. training program there from July-September 2005 and again in March 2006.

Babies born by Caesarean section rest in the nursery at Rabia Balkhi Hospital in February 2005. Donna Harris, a clinical assistant professor of nursing from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee who took the photo, was one of many consultants who have recommended ways to improve care at the hospital.

Dr. Jean Amoura, an ob/gyn, was part of a University of Nebraska Medical Center team that visited Rabia Balkhi for four days in December 2004 to provide continuing education separate from the U.S. government training program. Amoura said she was disturbed by the physical condition of the hospital and questioned how it would be possible for its Afghan attending physicians to serve as trainers for young resident doctors, a key element of the U.S. program.

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At the grand re-opening of Rabia Balkhi Hospital in April 2003, then U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson announced: "Today is a new day in Afghanistan, where we now have a new hospital for women to receive top-notch health care..." Dr. Pamela Hyde was the first ob/gyn assigned by HHS to train at the hospital. She took this photo. She and others found the reality inside the hospital starkly different.

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