Mumbai: 1 held, 4 booked for abusing, manhandling woman doctor

On Saturday, resident doctors of KEM Hospital took out a silent march to Bhoiwada police station, demanding an FIR be registered against the family members of Parmar.

On Saturday, resident doctors of KEM Hospital took out a silent march to Bhoiwada police station, demanding an FIR be registered against the family members of Jatin Parmar.

On Saturday, resident doctors of KEM Hospital took out a silent march to Bhoiwada police station, demanding an FIR be registered against the family members of Parmar.
On Saturday, resident doctors of KEM Hospital took out a silent march to Bhoiwada police station, demanding an FIR be registered against the family members of Parmar.

The Bhoiwada police has arrested one person and booked four others for allegedly abusing and manhandling a female resident doctor at KEM hospital after the death of an 18-year-old patient Jatin Parmar died following a cardiac arrest. The men, all relatives of Parmar, claimed that he was still alive and forced the doctors to restart the ventilator and manhandled an on-duty female resident doctor, police added.

On Saturday, resident doctors of KEM Hospital took out a silent march to Bhoiwada police station, demanding an FIR be registered against the family members of Parmar. A case was registered under several IPC sections along with Maharashtra Medicare Service Persons and Medicare Service Institutions Act against five persons, police said. The patient’s brother was arrested late Saturday, police added.

According to KEM hospital authorities, Parmar had a fever and was earlier admitted to a private nursing home for three days. “There he had three episodes of fits. As he needed a ventilator, he was transferred to KEM hospital at 9.05 pm on September 7,” a hospital official said. At the time of admission, the patient was suffering from fits and was breathless, the official added.

Dean of KEM hospital Dr Hemant Deshmukh said, “After admission at KEM hospital, Parmar was immediately put on a ventilator as his saturation was 80 per cent on 15 litres per minute oxygen. His clinical condition was explained to the accompanying relatives. Apart from ventilator, he was treated with antibiotics, anti-fit medications, IV fluids and blood pressure maintenance medications. Despite all the efforts, the patient’s condition was deteriorating, which was communicated time and again to close relatives.”

At 1.20 am on September 9, Parmar suffered a cardiac arrest and died, Deshmukh said.

“Parmar was declared dead in the presence of his brother and maternal uncle after showing them a flat ECG line, which is indicative of death,” Deshmukh said.

However, after sometime Parmar’s relatives entered the ICU and claimed that the youth was declared without informing them and tore the ECG, police said. “They abused the female resident doctor and even manhandled other hospital staffers,” Senior Inspector Vinod Kamble of Bhoiwada police station said.

The hospital authorities said the patient’s relatives claimed that Parmar was still alive and forced the resident doctor to restart the ventilator.

“Any ventilator, when switched on even without being attached to a patient, shows certain graphs during breath delivery and was misinterpreted as spontaneous breathing activity by the patient’s relatives. On their insistence, a senior physician on call was called in and after the intervention of police, the ventilator was disconnected,” Deshmukh added.