Should Doctors Be Tried in Consumer Courts

The Indian Supreme Court has ruled that doctors tramp be sued for checkup negligence in consumer court of laws set up under Indias consumer security act of 1986. The landmark judgment, delivered last week, caps the nine year old brawl oer whether doctors providing medical serve to endurings on payment of fees can be held liable under this act. Responding to appeals by doctors against earlier judgments by state too-generously courts, the Supreme Court ruled that endurings aggrieved by deficiencies in medical services rendered for payment can claim damages Should doctors be tried in consumer courts?This issue requires much debate, a portion of questioning, withal a lot of introspection. only before we do that, let me ask, why do we curtail ourselves to consumer courts Why ar we afraid to move to criminal courts if the quantum of crime is guilty enough to be tried entirely in criminal courts When I say this, I wish to emphasize on the point that doctors are after all h uman beings. They are bound to get carried remote by pleasure of life, greed for m integrityy and desire for a lavish lifestyle. This whitethorn encourage the devils inside them, they may switch over to sinful activities, may mint quick money and fulfill their hiddendesires.Somebody, at this instance, may like to raise a point that doctors are human beings also when they are performing complex surgeries. They are bound to make excellent mistakes, forget a glove back in the stomach of a commodiousanimous role, inadvertently deliberate a wrong injection, prescribe unknowingly a useless drug. Agreed I dont suggest fierce punishment for such situations. just I wish that we do not neglect this issue in totality and that too for deuce reasons. One, because if we let a doctor to got scott free after leaving a functional instrument into a patients abdomen, we are encouraging his carelessness. on that point is one in each chance that this mistake may repetition itself and the do ctor will never repent for it. Another reason I discourage this practice is- A black sheep in the herd of sacred doctors, may, under the veil of Non purposeful mistake Do penal activities. He, for his unethical gains, perform acts as prescribe a banned drug to his patient and when he get access to it, supply it potential buyers abroad. Not only this, on pretext of a small operation, he may tally vital organs from the body of a patient while the patient trunk in dark.Unlawful activities, but with a lesser criminal intention, could be purposefully keeping a patient in intensive care unit although there is no need of it This point reminds me of a field, where in a patients family proved themselves smart enough for the doctors. Let me give a first hand description of this, although in brief. A patient on death bed, with serious kidney malfunction was admitted in a brass infirmary. Observing the serious condition of the patient, he was instantaneously recommended to a get around equipped snobby hospital. unluckily, he breathed his last on the way. apace the private hospital issued a death certificate. Unsatisfied with the callous spot of doctors from government hospitals he was again admitted in the government hospital. The hospital say him dead after two days, issued a huge bill along with a death certificate. Armed with two death certificates issued on two different dates, the family published the horror story in media channels. This story is another(prenominal) reason why I did not blame only private hospitals and private doctors of illegal bunglings, because that would have shielded all government employ doctors.I blame this situation on the society as a whole and government policies in particular. Society because every 1 in 5 families of a patient is willing enough to have an illegal organ transplant or blood transfusion from an illegal reference if it guarantees the welfare of the patient. This encourages doctors to switch to illegal means for both need, small or big. And the government policies are equally responsible because the scenario since independence, by and large remains the same. There has been no increase in the numbers of opportunities available to this discriminate of people whom we call doctors.Instead we expect them to serve the masses, with minimal(or some clock times until now nil) infrastructure, no incentives and when compared to their better offs in IT and MANAGEMENT sectors, only a handful are able to give competition. But before blaming anyone else, Is it not the moral and ethical responsibility of a doctor to serve selflessly his logger beings? Is this not the first thing taught in medical colleges? May be I am keeping my foot on one more than(prenominal) than debatable matter. ? Now let me stir the pot a hour more. battalion die, as sure as they are born, they will die. Its a fact of life and one had better learn to accept it.People do not die ONLY because of doctors mistakes. If my memory does not drain me, the lady, whose death caused the JJ Hospital incident, was 75 years old. No details to the highest degree what she was suffering from, on how long she was ailing, or the condition she was brought to the hospital in. notwithstanding lacking these vital dfetails, you are ready to accept that the death was due to negligence. That is being unfair. Years ago, when I was still a houseman, we had a patient brought in with a myocardial infarction. The man had suffered a couple of infarctions over the years and his family was well aware that the next one could be fatal. disrespect our best efforts he died. The family accepted this and were taking the body away, when the youngest son arrived. This hombre had been step to the fore drinking, and made such a tamasha, threatening to kill the doctors, wow abuse etc. Eventually the security had to physically throw him out of teh hospital. Often these dramatic and explosive incidents take place to demonstrate grief, never theless phony it may be. I have witnessed many such incidents, and shade that even if there was negligence, the Consumer Protection Courts are available to redress any complaint. Beating up pepole is not the solution to the problem.Hi rocrab long time no earn , no hear from you on forums OK so you are a Doctor right So lets first evidence the fact that you are biased- right or wrong Ok hour point the JJ hospital fiasco was uncalled for thats for sure. And it also highlighted the plight of 100s of overworked doctors and their meagre stipends. But the fact remains is that you do something wrong you get punished. I do not think Consumer courts should turn out Doctors. As in lawyers they should be debarred from practising treat if found guilty. Anyways the point I want to bring out powerfully is that -1.People do not get in on deservingness they pay huge donations eg Manipal college. Totally shameless. 2. You pay to get in you can also pay to pass. 3. If you do not know what you are doing of course you are literally playing God. So what are we left with QUACKS by the dozen. That is why I think if some fear is instilled such clot play will lessen. Am starting another new topic on another issue that is close to my heart after the Jessica Lal forum. The novel strike by resident doctors in Mumbais JJ Hospital because a proportional of a victim who died slapped a doctor caused headlines for several days.My take on this matter is that the Public slaps, verbal and physical abuse,vandalising of hospitals etc is due to the fact that there is no other way to bring negligent Doctors to book in this country. That is why there are more and more instances of public outrage. What is more dangerous is the fact that these doctors who have caused such deaths CONTINUE to treat patients and localize them at risk with their little knowledge. And last night NDTV debated about this because a one Dr Saha is suing 4 Kolkotta doctors for Rs 77. 7 crore for neglige nce for his wifes death.So my question is Should such Doctors be tried for negligence and be punished in a court of law or not? If so what sort of court should try them like the military have a Martial law How long can we allow these so called quacks to get away with murder 18 Mar 2006 0703 pm 14 Rumhona, Totally agree with what you have say about money taking precedence over merit. Medical colleges operating(a) out of rented premises, lacking basic infrastructure. Deemed universities, sprouting like mushrooms after the rains, with no one to check or monitor the quality of teh education they endure or the doctors they produce.What is practiced by such doctors is criminal, no question of negligence. Unfortunately we have two sets of laws in India, one for the rich and one for the poor, this has been full demonstrated in the recent past. Despite all this each case has to be judged on its merits. Negligence as defined by law, is not doing that which a apt doctor would do. Now wha t a reasonable doctor would do, is there in black and white, in teh text books. But no text book can describe ALL the medical conditions and the complicating factors.Medicine is also subjective, so things can get tricky. Every medical prognosis put forward by an expert will be refuted by another equally qualified expert. (An expert being one who knows more and more about less and less, till eventually he knows every thing about nothing. )Finally, the quality of medicine practiced in India is exquisite miserable. My wife who is diabetic and hypertensive, was nearly killed by a consultant, who could not see beyond the infection he was treating. Eventually, I had to bring her down to my hospital where she began recovering in 24 hours.