ROURKELA: When 45-year-old Neeraj Chaturvedi, in a humanitarian gesture, rescued and rushed a profusely bleeding road accident victim to the RSP-run Ispat General Hospital (IGH) a few days back, little did he expect that the doctor would not treat the victim until the treatment cost was borne.
Taking to Twitter, the Samaritan said the doctor at the casualty after first aid insisted him to immediately deposit Rs 5,000 for admission of the patient. For about 90 minutes the victim lay on the stretcher without treatment till he asked his friend to get him the amount as he did not have cash and deposited it.
On April 21, Chaturvedi said he saw some people trying to call ambulance at an accident site near Pantha Niwas at around 2.15 pm and decided to immediately take the victim to IGH in his car to save the golden hours, as the hospital is Rourkela's largest and was 2.5 km from the spot.
However, there he was asked to cough up Rs 5,000 before the victim, Md Bashir, could be treated. Incidentally, shortly after Chaturvedi left, Basir's wife and daughter arrived and the IGH authorities asked them to deposit more money for further treatment.
As the family was financially crippled, they expressed inability to pay and took Basir to Rourkela Government Hospital (RGH) from where doctors referred him to the JP Hospital, an empanelled hospital under the Free Treatment Trauma Fund (FTTF) scheme in the first 48 hours of accident.
Informing about the incident to Sundargarh Collector in a tweet, Chaturvedi asked ,"Please suggest next time should I help or not as every time I cannot pay."
Sundargarh Chief District Medical and Public Health Officer (CDM&PHO) SK Mishra while lauding the humanitarian action of Chaturvedi, regretted that that he had to pay the money, adding the administration would ensure a refund. He said the RSP-run IGH is governed by SAIL's own rules and regulations and he would talk to the IGH Director on how such issues could be resolved.
The PR department of RSP, however, denied delay or refusal of treatment for money and said the patient was immediately given first-aid and even before completion of paper work, he was admitted in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and it was decision of the accident victim's family members to take him to RGH. Meanwhile, the patient continues to be critical at the JP Hospital.