A woman’s family believes that a Hunan hospital’s staff are responsible for her death shortly after she gave birth.

A 27 year-old woman, surnamed Zhang, died during a C-section operation at Xiangtan Women and Children’s Hospital on August 10, 2014. The woman’s family believes hospital negligence was the cause of her death, reported People’s Daily on August 13. Her husband, surnamed Liu, alleged that the doctors and nurses disappeared after his wife’s death and abandoned her body on the operating table.

After more than 11 hours, from the beginning of the operation around 12:00 p.m., the family claimed that no one from the hospital updated them about the surgical operation. Worried about his wife, Liu opened the operation room’s door and found his wife lying naked on the surgical table. Her mouth was covered with blood and there were tears in her eyes, the newspaper said. Several men were seen chewing nuts and smoking cigarettes next to his wife’s body, according to Liu.

Hospital doctors claimed they did everything they could to save Zhang’s life.

According to the hospital, after delivering a healthy baby, Zhang was coughing and vomiting, due to what was believed to be an amniotic fluid embolism, a rare birth complication that has an 80% death rate. The complication occurs when either amniotic fluid, or fetal cells, enter the mother’s bloodstream and cause an allergic-like reaction, according to a report by AP. One in 20,000 women suffers from this complication during childbirth, reported ifeng.

The hospital said they immediately took emergency measures; but, Zhang died at 21:30, due to organ failure caused by the complication, reported Beijing News. The hospital explained that “the doctors and nurses are not gone, but are just resting”.

A Xiangtan health official is equally supportive of the medical staff at the hospital. Deputy director of the Xiangtan health department, Qi Xianqiang, said, “That evening, the family only went in once. The medical staff were, in fact, in an adjoining room resting; they do not have a duty to stand guard next to the deceased. As well, the body had not been moved from the operating room.”

According to a Weibo post by a user, the real reason why doctors and paramedical staff left the operation room was due to the victim’s family’s agitated behaviours and vandalism. The posted photos showed white banners hanging across the hospital’s front gate, with black characters written next to smudges of “blood”. One of the banners read, “Return my wife! (We need to) see if she is alive! Otherwise, we need to see her corpse!”

The family demanded RMB 1.2 million worth of compensation; but, this was rejected by the hospital. Local heath and law departments are investigating the case.

Photos: Sina Weibo; Xiangtan Public Metropolis TV Station