The difficulties and uncertainties that face those who fall ill in India are growing. Expenses are also mounting and one has to be really patient to be a patient, or his or her relative.
What happened to our family recently appeared to have a resonance for many people known to us, with whom the experience was shared.
My mother-in-law, 84, complained of chest pain and my sister-in-law took her to a doctor. After examination he suggested she be admitted to a leading corporate hospital. He gave a letter addressed to the particular hospital. While on the way to the hospital, she collapsed. The hospital admitted her in the emergency ward and later moved her to the intensive care unit.
The hospital promptly sought Rs. 30,000 as deposit, and only two of us were allowed to see the doctor in the ICU. The cardiologist informed my sister-in-law and I that the patient’s heart had been revived, but she was unconscious; we should wait for three hours. The doctor added that once she regained consciousness, an angiogram and if required an angioplasty would be done.
I wondered aloud whether it would be possible to do all these procedures on a person whose condition seemed so precarious. But the doctor replied categorically that if the procedure was done there would be a 50 per cent chance of survival; else there was none. We kept quiet. Meanwhile he said a CT scan would be done.
The hospital asked for another Rs. 50,000, and one of the waiting grandsons promptly paid it. The admission had happened around 6 p.m. and even after several hours nothing including the proposed CT scan had been done. Around 10 p.m., all the waiting relatives including my 90-year-old father-in-law left for their homes, leaving a grandson and I waiting.
The specialist soon reappeared and called both of us to tell us the patient was now conscious. We could not quite believe that; I asked the nurse whether a blink of the eye indicated a state of consciousness. She looked blank, indicating a negative answer.
But the doctor proceeded with an angiogram and stenting. He showed us certain images on the computer screen adding that after all she may not survive. Still he proceeded with angioplasty as well.
Around 11.30 p.m. the doctor left for home and asked us to wait for one more hour. But around 12.30 a.m. we were asked to wait for some more time, and by 1 a.m., within hours of admission, they sought our permission to withdraw ventilator support. And she was declared dead. We were asked to clear the bills. The bill was Rs. 2.15 lakh. Surprisingly, the body was handed over to us in a fully covered condition.
Should the patient have been put through all that when the prognosis was pretty clear at the outset? Has this sort of thing become standard practice?
For the ordinary citizen, there is none to turn to and ask this question. The lack of a regulatory system for the functioning of hospitals, I reckon, is principally behind this. This issue has been raised in many forums, but the concerns seem to persist.
srinivasaramanan@hotmail.com
