HYDERABAD: It has come to light that patients without any attendants, who are admitted with chronic diseases at the Osmania General Hospital, are often secretly dumped at deserted corners of the hospital compound.
These “unknown patients” (as called by the hospital authorities) die in the open air without being attended to by anybody.
Afzalgunj police has quite a few cases of unidentified bodies being recovered within the hospital premises. These patients are usually brought to the hospital by the police after they are found unconscious or extremely ill at different areas in the city.
Sources at the Afzalgunj police outpost at Osmania General Hospital said that though the hospital authorities admit them initially, these patients are later abandoned behind the hospital old building, near the OGH compound wall, or some other unpopulated open area on the hospital premises in the early hours.
Every day, two to three such patients are allegedly abandoned by the hospital.
“Once these patients die, the hospital authorities inform the police officials, who then shifts the bodies to the mortuary,” said a source from the Afzalgunj police station.
On Thursday alone, at least three such patients were found out in the open with IV fluid drips in their hands.
When approached by the police, duty doctors say that they can't be treated since they are “unknown patients”. “Two days ago two patients were found on the open ground behind the old building. After we pressured the duty doctor, they were taken into the ward, but, one of them died in a few hours,” said a police officer from Afzalgunj police station.
Early on Thursday morning, Afzalgunj police found an extremely ill naked woman on the ground near the old building and alerted the hospital authorities. After hours of persuasion by the cops, the victim was taken inside the ward.
Many terminally ill patients are admitted by their relatives to the hospital who stay and look after them for two to three days. However, most of them disappear after that, leaving behind wrong contact numbers, incorrect addresses and in some cases, wrong names. Due to this reason, those without attendants are moved elsewhere.
A senior doctor with the hospital said, “We can admit a patient only if there is an attendant. Even after admission, if the attendant disappears then we can’t take care of the patient. This is a hospital and not a home for the destitute.”
According to medical protocol, patients are to be treated for a disease, but the recovery takes place at home where proper care must be provided.
In 2013, 15 such patients were found in the hospital and they had to be shifted to Old Age Homes on the city outskirts. Dr P. Srinivas, the in charge superintendent explained, “The presence of one family member or attendant in the hospital is compulsory. But we see that people are leaving the patients here and going away.
Rajesh Sahay of Tarnaka, who works at the Old Age Home where some patients from the Osmania General Hospital were shifted, said, “The patients are abandoned by their relatives when they are at the end of their lives.”
“Their condition deteriorates further in the hospital and by the time they come here, it worsens. Some of them end up having worms in the infected areas and it becomes very difficult to manage as no one is willing to touch them,” Mr Sahay said.
Experts said that the law enforcement agencies can take suo moto action against the hospital authorities for negligence.
If patients die out in the open, the police can book cases against the hospital staff under Section 304 A of the IPC for causing death due to negligence.
