The Delhi High Court on Friday issued notices to the Union and the Delhi Governments and the Ambedkar Hospital in Rohini here on a petition drawing the attention of the Court to the denial of admission to a pregnant woman by the hospital authorities when she was in labour pain forcing her to deliver the baby outside the hospital. The incident took place on July 11.
Issuing notices for August 2 on a petition by the woman, Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw asked the hospital authorities to explain the denial of admission to the woman and also file a status report on the medical condition of the mother and the baby.
The hospital had refused to admit the 24-year-old woman, Suman, when her husband rushed her there after she had gone into labour pain, saying that there was no empty bed to accommodate her. The doctors on duty asked her husband to take her to the nearby Sanjay Gandhi Hospital.
However, she delivered the baby outside the emergency ward of the Ambedkar Hospital while on the way to the Sanjay Gandhi Hospital. It was only after protest sby the people present in the hospital that the doctors came to cut the umbilical cord.
Later, the hospital had admitted her and the baby for the post-natal care. However, she was forced to leave the hospital after a few days when she failed to pay for the chargeable part of the treatment.
The Court asked the hospital authorities to explain why the woman was forced to leave the hospital after she failed to make payments for the chargeable part of the treatment. It also asked the Delhi Government to send an ambulance to the residence of the woman to take her and the baby to the hospital for medical check-up.
The hospital had refused admission to the woman despite a Delhi High Court order that government hospitals here cannot refuse admission to patients requiring emergency care.
