Two incidents at government hospitals raise questions on patient safety

A syringe-wielding man under the guise of a doctor threatened a patient and snatched her gold chain at K.C. General Hospital recently, while a D-group employee at the Government Hospital at K.R. Puram has been arrested for taking pictures of a patient while she was undergoing an ECG procedure. These incidents have raised questions about the safety of patients in these hospitals.

It has been a week since the incident at K.C. General Hospital, yet the perpetrator has not been caught. Police sources said Padmavatamma of Nelamangala was admitted to the hospital following an accident in which she had fractured her legs. On November 25, at around 2.45 p.m, a man in his 20s, entered the special ward wearing a white coat and a stethoscope and walked towards Padmavatamma.

Mohan Rajanna, Resident Medical Officer of the hospital, said the nurse in the ward mistook him as a house surgeon medical student. “He pretended to check the medical records of the patient and sent the nurse to fetch a lab report. As the unsuspecting nurse left the ward, the man wielded a syringe and threatened the patient, telling her that he would inject her unless she gave him the gold chain she was wearing. When she began to scream, he covered her mouth and tried to inject her in the neck with an empty syringe. He snatched away her gold chain and dashed out of the ward,” said Dr. Rajanna.

In another incident, a woman who had been to the Government Hospital at K.R. Puram to get an ECG done, noticed a D group employee taking inappropriate photos of her when she had partially undressed. She snatched the phone and found similar photos of other women as well on his phone and reported him to the hospital management on Thursday.

She put up a post on a social media site recounting the incident, following which the police approached the victim and tried to convince her to lodge a complaint. She, however, declined to do so. Abdul Ahad, DCP, Whitefield, said the police had taken up a suo motu case and booked the employee Raghavendra. He has been working on contract in the hospital since 2014, and was arrested on Saturday.