A one-year-old burn victim died at Bundelkhand Medical College Hospital in Madhya Pradesh after her parents failed to procure a ventilator worth Rs 1 crore. The parents were allegedly yelled at by the doctor who told them that the child can be treated only if they bought the ventilator.
The doctor, Dr. Jyoti Raut, has been suspended and an inquiry was launched after a video went viral on social media of her demanding the parents to get the required equipment.
A five-member committee led by additional commissioner VS Rawat and four doctors will conduct an investigation into the matter and will submit the report in a couple of days.
"The doctors were not treating the child. They asked us to take the child to a private hospital. We lodged a complaint with the hospital authorities. It was when a lady Dr Jyoti Raut came to treat the child. An enraged Dr Raut first told us that the child needed a ventilator but it was not functioning at the hospital," the child's uncle told Hindustan Times.
"Then she said the hospital didn't have a ventilator and she would treat the child if we could arrange a ventilator the cost of which was Rs 1 crore. The apathy of the hospital and the doctor took the life of the child."
"The doctor also said that since there was no ventilator she was doing it manually in the section of the hospital where she was working. The child died later. They lodged a complaint with hospital staff," he added.
The victim, Anshika Ahirwar, a one-year-old child in Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, had fallen into a pot of boiling water a few days back and suffered 70 per cent burns.
"The medical college has 17 ventilators but the burn ward doesn't have any. The doctor's behaviour was inappropriate. That's why she was suspended," said Dr GS Patel, the college's dean.
However, Raut criticised her suspension alleging that the video was edited. She said, "The video clip is edited and doesn't show the entire conversation. I was surrounded by the relatives of the patient and they were exerting unnecessary pressure on me to give treatment to the child by calling other doctors. There was no security. I was already treating the child and did my best."
