Bhubaneswar: The death of an elderly Covid-19 patient from Talcher exposed the glaring mismanagement at a dedicated Covid-19 hospital of a premier private medical college in the Capital city. The deceased’s son has lodged a complaint with the Infocity police alleging negligence on the part of the hospital staff as the cause behind the elderly patient’s death.
The incident also brought to fore confusing Covid-19 testing results from different hospitals.
According to sources, the deceased Karnvir Ray, 85, was a resident of Hatatota area in Talcher of Angul. The family members of Ray took him to a hospital at Mandarpal for check-up after he complained of difficulty in breathing, April 24.
The hospital authorities took samples of Ray for Covid-19 test.
Later, the family rushed Ray to Angul District Headquarters Hospital where his sample was tested and he was found to be infected with Covid-19. They referred Ray to SCB Medical College and Hospital in Cuttack for advanced treatment keeping in view his age and health condition.
Ray was later shifted to the dedicated Covid-19 hospital of a private medical college in Bhubaneswar, April 25.
The family’s ordeal started after Ray managed to get admitted to the Covid-19 hospital. They alleged that the hospital staff neither asked for any past clinical details of Ray from the family nor gave them admission-related documents. The family is yet to get any treatment related document from hospital despite repeated desperate requests.
The help desk at the hospital also proved useless as none at the desk was able to inform the family about the actual health status of Ray inside the Covid hospital despite repeated calls during the next two days.
The family was kept in the dark till the intervention of Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) for Zone VI, Prakash Chandra Pal, two days after his admission. The ACP after enquiry informed the family that their patient had succumbed to Covid-19 in morning of April 27.
The family waited till night to get the dead body of Ray for cremation. Quite interestingly, the hospital staff while handing over the dead body informed the relatives that Ray had died during evening, alleged relative.
The family also claimed spotting blood stains on back of Ray’s head before the cremation at Satya Nagar crematorium here. They had photographs of the dead as proof for their claims.
The family members accused that the head injury caused due to negligence of the hospital had resulted in Ray’s death.
However, police sources expressed their helplessness in this regard as, according to them, the family lodged the complaint after cremation of the body which the family members also admitted to.
The family lodged a complaint in this regard with the police, April 28.
Speaking to Orissa POST, ACP Pal informed, “We have sought all the details of the patient from the hospital through CDMO. The CDMO will probe the allegations and submit a report to the police. We can take any action only after going through the report.”
Meanwhile, Ray’s family members told this media that they expect the police would be impartial so as to deliver justice.
PNN