Blame the system!

The following is a recect article in Times of India.

BANGALORE: Even as cities have started invoking the Epidemic Act after the tragic death of young Rida from Pune, a key hospital in Bangalore which is authorised to treat H1N1, seems to be taking it easy.

Sample this: a patient with symptoms of swine flu goes to the hospital for a check-up; the doctors ask her to wear a mask and go home, and come again the next day.

On Wednesday, a Times Now journalist visited Victoria Hospital, posing as a swine flu patient. She was not only taken to the isolation ward without any prior check-ups, she was also asked to go back home.

When she explained her symptoms to the junior doctors, one of them took her to the isolation ward straightaway. “I just came back from Singapore and I have been having symptoms like fever and severe cough. I got it checked, but the doctors said it could be normal cold. After the Pune incident, I got very worried and that’s why I came here for a check-up. I live with my sister and she has two very young children,” she said.

The junior doctor explained the procedure of getting admitted to her: that throat swab samples will be taken the next morning and sent for testing. Till then, the patient could keep her face covered with a mask and stay at home. “You can go home today. Don’t go near the children and keep your face covered. Come back tomorrow morning and get admitted. Your throat swab will be taken and if it tests positive, you will be isolated for five days and put on Tamiflu,” she said.

The journalist also asked if there are enough stocks of Tamiflu in the authorized government hospitals and the doctors confirmed that the situation was not very bad. In spite of the patient repeatedly reminding the doctors that there were very young kids at home, the doctor told her: “It’s ok if you don’t get admitted today. If I tell you to get admitted now, will you? Go back and consult your family and then come."

Now it is not the doctors to blame. What the Junior Doctor told speaks of pure common sense. In India, the status of Government Hospitals is as it is. No people who have money come or get admitted to the Govt. Hospital. This person who has come from Singapore can be assumed to have enough money for her treatment at a private set up. Its almost obvious that even if anyone is advised to get admitted, they would get back to home and get advise from the family. Usually no one in Victoria gets admitted without a companion to look after them as there is not enough staff to look after each and every patient. Over that the Junior Doctors are intelligent enough as to diagnose who is malingering and who is not! So they must have found out what this journalist is upto. If she had been a true Swine Flu Patient, they would have recognised and also the patient would have naturally told that she shall discuss regarding admission from her family. But here the case is not so!! It is a very common scenario of cases of malingering at the hospital where the person comes and gives false story to get admitted to the hospital for the sake of food & shelter which is almost free. So the doctors are experts in identifying them and avoid their admission. Here the Doctor has played good role of both identify the malingering and also speaking common sense.

So its not the Doctors or the media to be blamed, Blame the system!!!