New Delhi, The Delhi State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission has held a city hospital guilty of deficiency in service for failing to arrange a life-support ambulance and an accompanying doctor for a critically ill stroke patient, and directed it to pay ₹ 15 lakh in compensation.
“In the present case, the record unequivocally reflects that the hospital failed to make adequate arrangements for the transportation of the patient, thereby resulting in the wastage of precious and critical time at a juncture when the patient was in an extremely vulnerable condition and required immediate medical intervention,” it said. “We are constrained to observe that a hospital, particularly one which holds itself out as a premier medical institution and charges substantial amounts from patients for the medical facilities and treatment rendered by it, cannot absolve itself of its fundamental obligations towards patient care,” it said. The duty of a hospital, the commission said, does not come to an end merely on providing consultation or administering treatment within its premises.
A bench of President Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal and Judicial Member Pinki allowed a 2015 complaint filed by Suresh Kumar, through his wife, against Metro Hospital & Heart Institute in Lajpat Nagar. Kumar, who had undergone dual valve replacement surgery at AIIMS in 2008, was rushed to Metro Hospital on November 13, 2013, with acute breathing difficulty, and an echo test showed a clot obstructing the artificial valve, according to the complaint. It also rapped the hospital for failing to adhere to the elementary standards of reasonable care and medical responsibility expected of it. It claimed that the hospital wasted about five hours, did not provide an ambulance or a doctor to shift him to another hospital, and that they eventually arranged an ambulance from another hospital themselves.
