Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute and Research Centre (RGCI &RC) and its two doctors have been held guilty of "negligence" by the apex consumer commission which directed them to pay Rs five lakh compensation to the husband of a cancer patient, who died in 2001.
The National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) upheld the Delhi State Consumer Commission's order directing the country's premier cancer hospital along with its Director Dr Y P Bhatia and the then Surgical Oncology Consultant Dr K K Pandey to pay the compensation amount to Lieutenant Colonel (Retd) Zile Singh Dahiya, whose wife had died due to their "negligence" in treating her.
The Commission said it was all the more unfortunate that the delay in diagnosis and treatment happened "at a premier institution of great repute".
"It is a clear case of medical negligence as well as deficiency of service. Therefore, we find ourselves in full agreement with the finding of the State Commission that the failure to provide proper diagnosis and treatment to the patient amounted to medical negligence," a bench headed by Justice D K Jain said.
"It goes without saying that when a person decides to be treated in such an institution, it is with the expectation of higher quality of treatment and care...In this view, we do not consider it appropriate to reduce the quantum of compensation (Rs 5 lakh) as awarded by the State Commission," the bench, also comprising members Vineeta Rai and Vinay Kumar, said.
It noted that the conduct of the two doctors "clearly falls below the standard of an ordinary competent person exercising ordinary skill in that profession".
The bench was hearing an appeal by the hospital against the State Commission's 2008 order directing the institute and the two doctors to pay the compensation to Dahiya.
Dahiya had stated that in 1999, he had taken his wife Krishna Kumari, who was suffering from cancer of the cervix, to the institute for a second opinion, after having her radiation therapy done at a hospital in Rohtak. Doctors at the Institute performed surgery on her and discharged her, he said.
