16 hospitals get notice for not refunding excess amount

Nagpur: Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) has served show cause notice to 16 private hospitals for not reducing bills and refunding excess amount to Covid patients. These hospitals have allegedly refused to follow the civic body’s orders despite bills being scrutinized and letters issued by auditors.
Approved by municipal commissioner Radhakrishnan B, NMC additional municipal commissioner Jalaj Sharma issued notices to 11 hospitals on Wednesday. They are Nucleus Mother and Child Super Specialty, Aureus Institute of Medical Sciences, Grace Ortho, Medicare Multispecialty, Sengupta, Sushrut Institute of Medical Sciences, Central Hospital, Ganga Care, Samarpan Hospital and Research Institute, CIIMS and Ever Shine.
Notices were served to five other hospitals-- Shree Bhavani Multispecialty, SevenStar, Sunflower, Viveka and Zenith in last couple of days.
Sharma warned of action if they failed to submit reasons behind non-compliance with notices issued by auditors directing to refund excess amount to the patients.
Sharma told TOI notices were issued to 16 hospitals of which first five submitted their replies. “Appropriate action will be taken against them if they do not refund excess amount to patients,” he said.
TOI on Tuesday had reported the private hospitals continued to charge far higher rates than those approved by the state government and relatives of patients running from pillar to post to find auditors appointed by the NMC and get bills cross-checked.
Sharma added, “Training has again been given to pre-auditors appointed at 64 private hospitals on Wednesday. They are thoroughly checking bills before hospital issues them to patients. Auditors have checked 2,494 bills at 64 hospitals from September 21 to October 13. They found discrepancies of Rs 77 lakh in 488 bills. Thirty three hospitals reduced bills by Rs 13 lakh after being pointed out by the auditors.”
Sharma also said, “We ensured reduction in bills as per government’s rates in over 100 cases even without issuing notices. Hospitals realized their mistake and corrected it.”
President of NGO Together We Can Joseph George said, “Government through notifications dated April 30, May 21 and August 31 had fixed rates for Covid as well as non-Covid patients. Main motive was to prevent loot of people already facing financial distress. There are provisions like levying penalty, cancelling the licence, registering FIR etc if hospitals charge more. NMC should take action as per provisions and not issue notice.”
Convener of Vidarbha Hospitals Association Dr Anup Marar said the association had already submitted its objections to the ‘unconstitutional’ audit initiatives of the NMC. He said a feeling was being fed into the minds of all discharged patients by vested interests that if they just filed a complaint with NMC or police, they would get some refund.
“When government caps the rates, it should have paid the bills of all patients. No compensation was ever given to any private hospital for utilization of manpower, infrastructure, material etc and serving under pressure in capped charges. Full taxes, and commercial charges for biomedical waste, electricity and water are being recovered from hospitals. Hospitals that contributed for Covid care are feeling hurt by the behaviour of authorities and public and they have landed in fiscal mess. Even non-Covid patients are treating them as untouchables,” Marar said.