KOCHI: At long last the District Medical Officer (DMO), Ernakulam, has received the request from the police for constituting the medical panel to look into issues of medical negligence leading to the death of MBBS student Shamna Tasnim of Ernakulam Government Medical College (EMC). DMO Dr N.K. Kuttappan told DC on Sunday that he formally received the request last Friday from the office of the Police Commissioner and the three member medical panel in the district chaired by him will take up the case after the Onam holidays.
“The panel comprising forensic surgeon and government pleader has to look into it and their names will be finalised after Onam apart from the names of other invited specialist doctors who need to be consulted in the case of Shamna,” Dr Kuttappan said. He said that the forensic surgeon on the panel would be deputed by the head of the forensic department at Alappuzha TD Medical College while the experts to be invited would be drawn from General Hospital Ernakulam only who come under Director of Health Service (DHS).
“The DMO is the chairperson of the panel. There is precedence in this regard. The Director of Medical Education won’t be consulted on this,” he said when it was asked whether the doctors under Director of Health Service can sit in judgment over commissions and omissions of doctors in medical colleges. Shamna who came to EMC with fever collapsed and died after the administering of the Ceftriaxone injection on July 18 and the twin investigations into the incident – one by the Joint Director of Medical Education and the other by the police – are yet to produce any result. Health Minister K K Shylaja had said that the report of the JDME will be brought before the next Cabinet meeting on September 20.
