Cardiologist hails Good Samaritan act of auto rickshaw driver

Jaideep Shenoy | TNN | Apr 13, 2020, 19:36 IST

MANGALURU: Yousuf, an auto rickshaw driver played the Good Samaritan’s role for a patient who inadvertently left behind his medical case file and life saving medicines in his autorickshaw while returning home after meeting the specialist. It was the presence of mind shown by Yousuf in spotting the file and medicines and calling the doctor concerned based on details therein, that enabled him to return it to a grateful patient.
Recalling the incident, Dr Padmanabh Kamath, cardiologist said, “Covid -19 is imposing lot of hardships for the common man and it is not sparing any particular population. A cardiac patient who after his visit to hospital (after great difficulty he got the appointment) left his case file and life-saving medicines in the auto he travelled. That was noticed by Yousuf later and he called the cardiologist (me) as that was the number printed in the case record.”
Later through the hospital records the patients credentials were traced and the driver returned the case file and all the drugs which the patient had painstakingly purchased, Dr Kamath said, adding this case exemplifies the presence of good Samaritans in all walks of life and we salute these real life heroes in uniform. The driver is from Moodbidri and the patient had recently undergone an angioplasty and the file and medicines were critical for him.
Based on information that Yousuf provided, Dr Kamath got Bharathi Suraj, house keeping staff of the hospital where he works trace the mobile number of the patient from hospital records and relayed it to the auto rickshaw driver. Bharathi also informed the patient as well to expect a call from Yousuf, who in the interim obtained the patient’s address and returned the same. Dr Kamath hailed this selfless act of Yousuf in a post he shared in WhatsApp.