MRI death at Nair Hospital: BMC blames ward boy, hospital help

The preliminary inquiry into the death of Lalbaug resident Rajesh Maru, who got sucked into the MRI machine at Nair Hospital in January, holds the MRI room’s ward boy and ‘ayaa’ (help) responsible for the fatal incident.

The inquiry report, which was submitted to Municipal Commissioner Ajoy Mehta on Thursday, states that the hospital staff failed to follow procedure, due to which Maru was able to carry an oxygen cylinder into the MRI room.

Municipal Commissioner Ajoy Mehta said, “This inquiry pins responsibility on the ward boy and the hospital help. Now, a detailed enquiry will be conducted into the exact role played by them which led to the incident. The quantum of punishment will be decided based on this enquiry.”

As per the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) procedure, the inquiry will include charge sheets against the hospital staff that has been responsible for the incident, and they will be given a chance to defend their case.

Maru, 32, died after being sucked into the MRI machine when he carried an oxygen cylinder — a metal object — into the room. It is prohibited to carry metal objects into the MRI room.

The incident took place on January 27 this year.

After three weeks of investigation, BMC concluded its preliminary inquiry.

Additional Municipal Commissioner, I A Kundan, who is in charge of municipal hospitals and health departments said, “We have pinned the responsibility on two members of hospital staff after interviews, questioning, and examination of CCTV footage available from that day. Events that took place prior to the incident were recorded on the camera outside the MRI room. A standard operating procedure for availing medical facilities is already in place but it was not followed. The two members of the staff failed to do their duty.”

The report also enlists administrative reforms to prevent such incidents from repeating in the future. BMC will soon set up a core committee of specialised doctors at each hospital level to outline procedures for each specialised service available at the hospital.

The report also recommends tightening security, reducing burden on municipal hospitals by 50 per cent, and regulating the entry of relatives of patients into hospital premises in order to manage crowds more efficiently, said Kundan.

Simultaneously, an independent departmental inquiry is ongoing against the doctors and nurses that were present in the MRI room at the time of the incident.