A car crash victim – who alleges he was told to walk home by Gauteng hospital staff who believed he was not injured – is suing the Health Department for R2m damages after it emerged he had a spinal injury.

The Mercury reports Meka Lukas Nkabin (66) is today a paraplegic, and medical experts told the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) that he would never walk again. Nkabine’s ordeal started in December 2009 when he was involved in a car accident. He was removed from the scene by an ambulance and taken to the Natalspruit Hospital.

He was admitted to the casualty department where he lay on a stretcher, waiting to be attended to.

Nkabine said the staff eventually glanced over him and instructed him to ‘get up from the stretcher and walk home’. He said he was not examined at that point to ascertain what his injuries were.

The nurses eventually agreed to get the opinion of a doctor, to confirm what they believed which was that there was nothing wrong with him. He said his family, however, insisted that he be transferred to the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital, where it was established that he had a spinal injury.

The hospital denied any negligence. It said he had to prove that he was rendered a paraplegic because of sub standard medical treatment.

Full report in The Mercury (subscription needed)