Queries

The journal India Today has published a totally distorted and motivated version of the case of Mrs. Leela Singh, denigrating a medical professional and the profession. lt projects the complainant as a crusader against malpractice in health care and the patient as the martyr of such a practice. This focuses attention on the following issues which need debate:

1. Is it unethical for a consultant or a honorary doctor to adhere to the admission and work-distribution norms of a hospital to which he is attached?
2. Is it in the purview of an Ethics Committee of a State Medical Council to dictate to a hospital on its admission policy and practice of distributing work?
3. Is it unethical for a doctor to refuse to accept a patient already being looked after by a competent colleague in the hospital or to refuse to interfere or oversee in his or her care?
4. Is it unethical for a consultant to limit one’s services to specifics and to refuse to take over the charge of the case in which he has been called as a consultant for opinion?
5. Is it unethical to advise surgical exploration in an inoperable cancer patient when she starts bleeding from the metastatic site?
6. Is it unethical to refuse to accept fee for services not rendered or services not to be rendered?
7. Is it ethical for colleagues to keep quiet when some doctors unwittingly and in their misplaced enthusiasm side with a self-styled crusader agasint medical malpractice to persecute, defame and criminally prosecute a senior colleague for his ethical conduct?