For third time in a week, patient’s kin assault doctor.
The relatives of a 60 year old patient trashed a doctor at the Lokmanya Tilak Municipal General Hospital and Medical College, Sion in Mumbai. The assault happened after the patient, who suffered from chronic kidney ailment died. Three people have been arrested related to this.
This is the third act of violence against doctors in just a week’s time. Responding to the incident, the doctors at the hospitals refused to return to work till adequate security measures were installed.
The assault took place at 10:30 PM on Saturday after the patient- Rekha Singh died in the hospitals. “The patient had returned to the hospital after taking Discharge Against Medical Advice (DAMA) in a critical condition. She was suffering from chronic kidney failure and was admitted at 12.10am on March 18,” said a doctor.
Though the patient underwent dialysis on Saturday morning, her condition soon began to deteriorate. It’s said that the doctors who treated her informed the family about this development.
“We had informed the family about the poor prognosis and medical complications in the case. The patient wasn’t responding despite the treatment,” said a resident doctors of the hospital.
At 10:50 PM on Saturday, the patient was pronounced dead.
According to the patient’s relatives, the medical staff at the hospital failed to give enough care for the patient. They beat up Rohit Kumar, a first-year PG student. As a senior doctor at the hospital puts it, “This is the first such incident of this year that has taken place in a well-guarded medical college of the city,”
As per Dr Suleiman Merchant, the hospital’s dean, “In an unfortunate incident last night, relatives of a patient, who was declared dead, tried to assault a first year med residence, luckily they were stopped in time by security. Resident was touched lightly, presence of security prevented further damage. An FIR is lodged and three people have been arrested.”
Security to be further heightened
Following the assault, the hospital has decided to hire even more security guards and also get more CCTV cameras.
The Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors(MARD) asked for Mumbai police’ intervention to protect the on-duty doctors.
“The issue is that 70% of posts for security personnel are filled by women. We need more male guards. Secondly, three constables from Sion police station are stationed at the hospital to register medico-legal cases, but they rarely intervene in patient-doctor scuffles,’ as per a resident doctor in the hospital.
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