Tata Memorial, its doctor to pay Rs 5L for negligence

MUMBAI: Parel's Tata Memorial Hospital and a doctor have been ordered to pay Rs 5 lakh compensation to a Raigarh-based woman who had to undergo two cycles of chemotherapy after an oncologist diagnosed her as suffering from stage 4 stomach cancer without even waiting for the biopsy report 16 years ago. The biopsy report procured subsequently did not detect malignancy.
The National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission said that the instant case, without tissue diagnosis advising chemo, was the act of omission. "It amounts to lack of due care from the oncologist, thus medical negligence," the commission said.
The commission said that this was a case of contributory negligence, because the patient, Sabitari Agarwal, herself was negligent, who did not bother to collect the biopsy report from the hospital and secondly, before starting first cycle of chemo, the hospital concerned did not verify the biopsy report. While Agarwal claimed that she was wrongly diagnosed, the national consumer commission did not rule on that aspect.
The report was ready on March 29, 2007 but by then Agarwal had left the city and undergone the first chemotherapy session on March 27, 2007. She collected the report only in June, 2007.
Agarwal moved the national consumer commission in 2012 after Maharashtra State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission rejected her plea. The state consumer commission had denied allegations that she was wrongly diagnosed as suffering from cancer. It had said that the oncologist had evaluated clinical reports properly and correctly and ever after discharge, a hospital in Udaipur still suspected that she was a case of carcinoma of stomach.
Before the national commission, Agarwal said that she had first come to the hospital from Chattisgarh on March 21, 2007 after complaining of abdominal pain and undergoing various tests. The ulcerated growths were sent for biopsy. She alleged that without waiting for the reports when she was asked to undergo chemotherapy, she went to Udaipur. She could afford only two chemotherapy cycles and also underwent a blood transfusion between the two sessions. She said that her condition worsened and she returned to Tata Memorial on June 11, 2007 where the report was finally taken. The woman said that losing confidence, she went back to Udaipur and was treated for other ailments. She said she suffered from TB, but took two chemo cycles unnecessarily.
The hospital and Dr Sudeep Gupta denied the allegations. Gupta submitted that best possible professional care and skill was taken to start the patient on appropriate management in existing circumstances, when the overall picture supported gastric carcinoma. He also submitted that even the Udaipur hospital report suspected cancer.