The relatives of a patient attacked a first-year resident doctor in ward number 20 of Lokmanya Tilak Municipal General Hospital, also known as Sion Hopsital, on Saturday night. The other resident doctors in the hospital wrote individual letters to the dean following the incident, and went on a mass bunk in protest on Sunday.
The doctors now say that they won’t resume work unless government authorities assure their safety and security.
The female patient concerned was admitted in the hospital after developing a chronic kidney disease, and was on dialysis. She eventually passed away on Saturday night.
Speaking about the incident, Dr Rohit Kumar Jain, the victim, who was slapped by the relatives of the 56-year-old patient, said, “The relatives who came to see her on Saturday night were not the same relatives who had come to admit the patient. The ones who slapped me did not even know about her medical condition and what kind of treatment she was undergoing. My duty hours had finished and I was about to leave the ward when the incident took place.”
Jain added, “There were more than seven relatives of the patient in the ward. The security personnel should have stopped them earlier from entering the ward, since such a large number of relatives is not allowed at one time.
There was one security guard present when the incident occurred. Luckily, I did not suffer any external injury. The other resident doctors supported me and stood up for me.”
A group of resident doctors later accompanied Jain to file a police complaint on Saturday night itself, and the Sion police arrested three of the relatives — Akash Sidhu (31), Aatish Ghavari (37) and Amit Singh (34) — under the Doctor’s Protection Act, 2010.
The letters that Sion Hospital’s resident doctors wrote to the dean stated that they will not be working till their safety and security in the hospital is assured. “We have been demanding for a year that the number of security guards be increased, but nothing has been done so far. This has been an issue for more than three years now. The number of patients and doctors is increasing, but the number of security personnel remains the same. The doctors do not want to resume duties unless an assurance of additional security is given to them. The dean of the hospital is supporting us,” said Dr Arun Jaiswani, one of the resident doctors.
Dr Suleman Merchant, the dean of the hospital, said, “It was an unfortunate incident... Luckily, the security guards stopped the relatives in time. The resident doctor was touched lightly, the security personnel present prevented further damage. An FIR was immediately lodged and three people have been arrested. It was traumatic for the resident doctor, though. We are in the process of establishing stricter protocols to prevent such incidents, including fast-tracking the creation of new security posts, filling vacant posts and installing more CCTVs, to name a few.”
This is the third incident in one week of a medical professional being attacked in Maharashtra. The Indian Medical Association (IMA) has suggested a few changes in the Doctor’s Protection Act to the state government. These include making it a central Act included in the CrPC, increasing the jail term for offenders from three years to seven years, no bail being given to the accused for a minimum of three months, and the gravity of the crime and injury to the doctor or medical staff being decided by a medical committee.
Dr Sagar Mundada of the IMA’s youth wing said, “We have spoken to the security personnel in Sion Hospital and a decision has been taken that henceforth only a senior doctor, not junior resident doctors, will intimate relatives about a patient’s death. Resident doctors from other hospitals will soon be joining the mass bunk in protest.”
