JOHOR BARU: A friend of the Singaporean who died in a hit-and-run accident here has admitted to Singaporean paper, The Straits Times, communication barriers with the staff at Sultanah Aminah Hospital (HSA) could have led to conflicting claims.
The Singaporean English daily reported that the five friends of 24-year-old victim Justinian Tan were unsure of what to do and the language barrier did not help.
Tan's friend, Joshua De Rozario said that he had no ill-intention when he related the ordeal that he went through after the Aug 25 incident.
Rozario previously spoke to Singaporean news outlets, including The Independent SG, Today and Lianhe Zaobao on the time it took for the ambulance to arrive at the scene and that the hospital demanded payment before treating Tan and another friend who were injured.
The Malaysian Health Ministry has denied both allegations.
"When the accident happened, a lot of things were going on at once, so the wait for help to come felt really long then. I thought it took 30 minutes but their logs said differently," De Rozario told The Straits Times.
He said there could have been miscommunication at the hospital as staff spoke Malay and they spoke in English.
"So many of us go to JB (Johor Baru) just for supper or shopping and we don't actually know what to do when something happens there," he said.
"That's the point we want to convey. It's not about wanting to get revenge, because that is not going to bring Justinian back. We want to move on," said De Rozario.
After Tan was admitted, HSA had determined that he suffered an injury to his brain and he was referred to neurosurgery team.
Malaysian Health Ministry director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah confirmed that urgent decompressive craniectomy plus removal of clot and intracranial pressure monitoring was planned without demand for any deposit payment.
Noor Hisham said emergency imaging and treatments required were not withheld or delayed and when the family members arrived, only then were they asked to make deposit as per protocol for foreigner patient.
"However the family members opted for discharge at on risk (AOR discharge) and arranged for admission to a hospital in Singapore after understanding the risk involved of further delaying the surgery," said Noor Hisham in a statement yesterday.
The Straits Times said Tan was in HSA for about five hours before he was transferred to the Singapore General Hospital. He was subsequently declared brain and died five days after the incident, when he was taken off life support.
Tan, who was an accounting student at the Kaplan Singapore, a private institution, was cremated at the Mandai Crematorium yesterday.