A preliminary post-mortem report has attributed the death of 11-year-old Pawan Yadav at Kolkata’s Medical College and Hospital to an intestinal perforation, severe infection and septic shock, while an internal inquiry has rejected his parents’ allegation that a wrong injection caused his death.
Pawan, from Howrah, died at Medical College and Hospital on Sunday. According to the preliminary findings reported by the Times of India, doctors conducting the post-mortem found pus collected in the boy’s abdomen and identified complications linked to a rupture in the small intestine.
The report indicated that the rupture had occurred at least four to five days before Pawan was brought to the hospital. The resulting infection is believed to have progressed to sepsis and septic shock, which the preliminary post-mortem identified as the immediate cause of death.
The findings were presented in the context of an internal inquiry committee formed by Medical College and Hospital after Pawan’s parents alleged that a wrong injection had caused his condition to deteriorate. The committee, according to the report, negated the allegation of medical negligence.
The preliminary report described the abdominal condition as a perforation-related complication rather than an injury caused by an injection. It also recorded the presence of pus in the abdomen, a finding that the report linked to the severe infection that preceded the boy’s death.
The case highlights the role of post-mortem examination and institutional inquiries in determining the cause of death when relatives raise allegations about treatment in a hospital. In this instance, the medical findings and the hospital committee’s conclusion point to an intestinal rupture that predated Pawan’s admission, rather than the alleged injection-related cause.
The findings remain preliminary, and the report supplied by the Times of India does not provide details of the boy’s symptoms before admission, the treatment administered at the hospital, the exact date on which he was admitted, or whether any further medical or administrative review is planned. The hospital’s internal inquiry has, however, recorded its conclusion that the wrong-injection allegation was not established.
