Rajendra Institute of Medical Science (RIMS), Director, Bl Sherwal, has opposed to any effort of blaming the hospital administration for death of an ailing kid on Sunday, who allegedly died because his parents fell short of managing mere Rs 50 for a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) test. Sherwal said that the hospital offered such hospitality of treating patients free of cost day in and day out.
However, he admitted that the system required to become more systematic as far as avoiding such cases was concerned. “It is not a question of a life less valuable than Rs 50 for us, as we use to offer free treatment in such cases, and many more day in and day out. We are bound to follow government rules, and there are cases when we walked extra mile to provide treatment on time to even Above Poverty line (APl) patients who were not able to fund tests right at the moment. What must have happened in yesterday’s case that patient’s wards didn’t reach out to right officials,” said Sherwal.
“That is where the problem of this largest government run Hospital lies. The one who comes to get one’s patient treated has no idea where to go for what. Help desks are pathetically unhelpful. The one whose entire focus is on getting his patient treated finds himself running around this corner to that with no one willing to help him,” said one Md Imran who had come from lohardaga to get his eight years son treated.
Ironically, even the Health Minister admitted two weeks ago at the time of inaugurating modular operation theatres and centralized test collection centre that the Hospital staff needed to be more sensible. He had pointed out issue of shortage of help desks and had directed officials to work on it as soon as possible. “We all are trying for the same. But kid’s death on Sunday was nearly unavoidable even after MRI could have been done, because he was brought to the Hospital after eight days of getting severely hurt and he had undergone massive internal bleeding. However, his parents didn’t reach to us after they were denied test for merely shortage of Rs 50, as all accidental tests even otherwise remained free of cost in hospital,” Sherwal added.
Notably, 12 -month old local kid died on Sunday after having denied test by Radiology Centre in RIMS premise named Health Map as one of its executives refused to take kid for test due to shortage of Rs 50 for MRI which cost Rs 1,350 in normal cases. “That is free in accidental cases, and it will remain free. But if one finds someone denying for tests merely due to shortage of test fees, he/she must come to us to get that tests done,” said Sherwal.