BENGALURU: After two long years of wait for the police to complete their investigation, a woman who lost her 19-year-old son to alleged medical negligence on the part of a private hospital in the city, owing to a dispute between the partners over ownership, has now approached the Karnataka High Court with a writ petition seeking justice. In her plea, she has said that she has lost all hope in the investigation into the case which has been with the Central Crime Branch all this time.
The woman, Susheelamma, works at a garment factory and had lost her husband nine years ago. She claims she spent lakhs towards her son’s hospital bills.
Speaking to The New Sunday Express, Susheelamma said, “My son was studying a diploma course when I lost him. He had met with a road accident near Mandya while returning with his friends from a trip to Mysuru. As he had sustained head injuries, his friends admitted him to a private hospital nearby. But as I felt it was too expensive, I shifted him Nirbhaya Super-specialty hospital in Malleswaram.”
The youth was in ICU for 20 days in the hospital and was on his way to recovery. Doctors had even advised that he could be discharged and to undergo physiotherapy at home. “We were really happy as he was recovering. But suddenly, one night, some unknown people started entering the hospital and forcefully sending out all the in-patients. As my son and another patient were on ventilator, one of the owners of the hospital said he will shift my son to a nearby hospital, but they shifted him without a ventilator,” explained Susheelamma.
She claimed that they kept her son in another private hospital for a day without ventilator and then was asked to take him to NIMHANS. “As I was worried about his condition, I immediately took him to NIMHANS. We reached NIMHANS around 8pm on July 11, 2016. But as he had been taken off the ventilator and there was no doctor available to attend on him at that hour, he died on the stretcher around 4.30am on July 12, 2016. A police complaint was filed, but till date no action has been initiated against Dr Narayana Swamy, one of the partners of Nirbhaya hospital. Fed up with this delay I had approached the court,” she said.
As there were other complaints of medical negligence too, the investigation was handed to the CCB where it is still pending.
When Express tried to contact Dr Narayana Swamy, he was unavailable for comment. Dr Balaji, another partner of the hospital told Express, “Even we have filed a complaint against him for misuse of powers and cheating. There are several cases filed against him.”