Daijiworld Media Network – Mysore (SP)
Mysore, May 16: Health and family welfare minister, U T Khadar, announced that inquiry will be initiated against the doctors and staff of the government K R Hospital at Mysore and also of a private hospital in the city for dereliction of duty if any in attending to the patients who were injured in a road accident which occurred on Wednesday May 14 near Kampalapura, Periyapatna.
Speaking to press persons after meeting the injured persons at Banavi Hospital Kuvempu Nagar here on Thursday May 15, he recalled that the Supreme Court had clearly directed all the hospitals, doctors, and other staff, to attend to the patients who need emergency treatment, without questioning or pestering them about payment.
'Relatives of 11 persons, who suffered injuries in the said accident, have complained that they failed to get the attention they needed at either K R Hospital or another private hospital in the city which had been approached by them. The government will pursue the matter in all its seriousness and ask the minister for medical education to investigate as to whether the hospital staff had erred in discharging their duties,' he said. Expressing deep anguish at the way the accident victims had been handled by two hospitals, he also charged the doctors of K R Hospital of trying to discourage the patients by insisting that the injured children have no chances of survival, and a private hospital of driving away the victims for not being able to make advance payment.
He gratefully recollected the timely help rendered by the citizens of Hunsur and Periyapatna in taking the injured persons to hospitals. He also praised the doctors of the private hospital which showed humane qualities, by treating the children and saving their lives. He stressed that those who lack value-based education and humanitarian concern should never run hospitals.
He clarified that after assessing the financial condition of individual patients, a decision will soon be taken about meeting their hospital expenses.