Jaipur / Hospital fined ₹50 lakh for patient’s death due to wrong treatment

Jaipur: The Rajasthan State Consumer Dispute Redressal Commission has imposed a fine of Rs 50 lakh on city’s Fortis Hospital, for treating the heart of a patient suffering from a stomach-related illness, leading to the patient’s death. The commission has also asked the hospital to return Rs 2.84 lakh spent in the treatment of the patient with interest.

The commission through Kamal Bagri, judicial member and Meena Mehta, member, has asked the Fortis Healthcare Limited to pay a sum of Rs 25 lakh with interest. The commission further stated that for the manner in which a patient who had complained of stomach ache was treated as a heart patient, a separate amount of Rs 25 lakh was imposed on the hospital as punitive damage, since the act of the hospital comes under serious offence.

The commission in its order further stated that the fine should be deposited in the State Consumer Welfare Fund along with interest. The commission gave this order on the complaint filed by Rekha Khunteta and others.

Counsel for the complainant, Vijji Aggarwal said, “On July 28, 2014, the complainant’s father Chetram was having difficulty swallowing food. The patient was then admitted to Fortis Hospital, Jaipur. Despite elaborating on abdominal pain, the doctors wrote the wrong history sheet and did ECG and Echo. Investigations suggested that 50% of the patient's heart was working. Thus, angiography and angioplasty were done, ignoring the complaint of abdominal pain. On July 30, haemodialysis was started on the patient. On July 31, patient died of a heart attack. It was sheer negligence on part of the hospital and doctors.