Joseph Theuri, 17, whose hand was chopped off in an accident and later restored through surgery, recuperates at Kenyatta National Hospital. PHOTO | ANTHONY OMUYA

Joseph Theuri, 17, whose hand was chopped off in an accident and later restored through surgery, recuperates at Kenyatta National Hospital. PHOTO | ANTHONY OMUYA





A boy whose hand was severed by a machine in January but had surgeons miraculously re-stitch it has been has been detained at Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) over a Sh452,000 bill.

Joseph Theuri, 17, was given the green light to hospital as from Monday as the hand had regained much functionality, according to his guardian Virginia Gathoni.

“It has recovered very well. He can even greet me with it,” Ms Gathoni said of Theuri’s restored right hand.

She added that the doctors had also removed the plaster supporting the re-attached hand to allow for him to exercise it.

Medics had predicted that the hand could regain up to 80 per cent of its functionality.

But Theuri ill wait a little longer to go home as he is being held back by the accrued bill. Theuri was rushed to the facility in an ambulance on January 26.

UNPAID BILL

The balance stood at Sh452,025 by 2pm on Tuesday, according to an invoice seen by Nation.

Among the monies he is required to pay is occupational therapy fee, physiotherapy fee and costs of two plastic surgery operations.

Theuri lost his parents early in life and Ms Gathoni, 40, has been raising him as her son at her home in Gachie, Kiambu County.

“The mother died when he was just three months old,” Ms Gathoni said.

Ms Gathoni’s main source of income is dairy farming and she told Nation that she cannot afford the pay the medical bill.

PASSIONATE PLEA

“I’m so down. My business can’t raise the fee. And it keeps increasing everyday until he leaves the ward,” she said in a passionate plea to well-wishers to help her foot the bill.

Theuri, a Standard Seven drop-out, was cleaning a chaff cutter used to produce cow feed at Ms Gathoni’s home when the accident happened.

He was rushed to the Kiambu County Hospital, where a medic preserved the severed hand, then was taken by ambulance to KNH where a team of 15 would later perform what has been termed the first ever successful hand re-attachment in Kenya.

Until he pays the bill, Theuri will continue staying at a KNH ward that his been his abode for close to three months.

“They are taking good care of him, even taking him for exercise when the time is due,” Ms Gathoni said on Wednesday.

Well-wishers can contact Ms Gathoni on 0706877809.