Niharika Sreekumar sat on the sofa in her home, clutching a photo of her and her husband, Prashant Sreekumar, in her arms.

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The 44-year-old passed away on Monday at Grey Nuns Community Hospital in Edmonton after coming into the emergency room complaining of severe chest pains. Hospital staff performed an electrocardiogram (ECG) test and blood test which came back with no abnormalities — Prashant waited eight hours in the emergency room before being seen. He died shortly after.

‘I want justice’: Wife demands answers and accountability after 44-year-old Edmonton man dies waiting in ER Back to video

“I want justice for Prashant,” Sreekumar said in an interview with Postmedia.

Prashant’s sudden passing has left Sreekumar devastated. At the same time, she doesn’t know how she will financially sustain herself and three children. Both Sreekumar and her husband are accountants, however, due to their youngest child needing 24/7 care, Prashant took on the role of the sole breadwinner.

She wants to see hospital staff held accountable for the way her husband was treated in the emergency department, and questions whether negligence or even racism played a role. 

“We are all Canadian citizens. We have worked and paid so much into the tax bucket in this country and the one time Prashant needed medical help, he was not given it,” Sreekumar said.

It was a regular Monday morning for the two of them, she said. He woke up and made chai tea for them before heading to work.

After three hours of him being at work, Sreekumar said Prashant called her saying he was having extreme chest pains.

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A client drove him to the hospital where she said staff performed an ECG test to check his heart’s health. She said when the results came back as “unremarkable” he was told to continue waiting. A blood test later showed there were no abnormalities. Staff also gave him Tylenol for his pain.

He continued to wait in the emergency room.

“(Prashant) calls me and he says, ‘Niharika, the pain is way too much,’ and he’s not able to speak, just fumbling,” Sreekumar said. 

After she arrived at the hospital, Sreekumar went to the admission desk with Prashant asking when he would be seen. She said he wanted to be the one to tell them how much pain he was in. He could barely stand, sit or breathe, she said. Sreekumar said her husband had already gone up several times saying his chest pain was acute. They were told by a woman at the front desk that his pain was not acute and there were others ahead of him with more acute problems.

“His blood pressure — I last recorded was 210, which apparently was not acute, was not problematic enough to give him medical attention right away,” she said.

When she went home briefly to take care of their three children, Prashant told her he had vomited. He was still not seen.

According to Alberta Health Services (AHS) the average wait time at Grey Nuns Hospital as of Dec. 26 is three hours and 36 minutes.

“The (front desk) lady told me, I see you guys came around 12, looking at the time right now, he has spent about six and a half hours. But the longest anybody has waited here is about 11 hours. So looking at the timelines … he’ll have to wait a little longer,” Sreekumar said.

Sometime later he was finally called and brought into a hospital room. Relieved her husband was finally being seen, Sreekumar and her father-in-law accompanied Prashant.

When she turned her back to him briefly, she heard him stand up from the hospital bed and he said in Hindi “Niharika, I’m dizzy,” and collapsed onto the floor with her and her father-in-law holding him on either side.

He died shortly after.

Sreekumar said the system needs to change.

“I was enjoying my life, now I’m going to just live every day hoping that it would pass,” she said. “I loved him so dearly. He was not only my husband, he was my only friend in this country. I don’t have as many friends. He had so many friends. What am I gonna do now?”

In a statement to Postmedia, Karen MacMillan, interim chief operating officer of acute and primary care at Covenant Health, said the case is currently with the office of the chief medical examiner and cannot comment around specifics at this time.

“We are deeply saddened regarding the death of a 44-year-old male patient at the Grey Nuns Community Hospital in Edmonton on December 22, 2025. We offer our sympathy to the patient’s family and friends. There is nothing more important than the safety and care of our patients and staff,” the statement said.

Sreekumar said she has not received any word from the hospital about her husband’s death.

In a statement, Acute Care Alberta said the organization is “deeply saddened by the death of a patient at the Grey Nuns Community Hospital,” and offers “sincere sympathies to this patient’s loved ones.”

The statement from the government agency that oversees acute care in the province goes on to say that Covenant Health has “initiated a review to fully understand the circumstances and identify any contributing factors in this case.”

“In line with our mandate to oversee acute care system quality, ACA will participate in this review. ACA will also receive a copy of the results of the review and will work closely with Covenant to ensure and support implementation of any recommendations.”

Alberta NDP critic for hospital and surgical facilities, Sarah Hoffman, and Jasvir Deol, MLA for Edmonton-Meadows, issued a joint statement on Friday demanding answers and a review by appropriate officials.

“This family needs justice,” the statement said.

“ERs across the province are overcrowded. The UCP’s health-care cuts and chaos means this has become an unacceptable reality that Albertans have to put up with.”

A GoFundMe has been set up to support the Sreekumar family.

ctran@postmedia.com

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