Kozhikode: Emergency dept or training ground

KOZHIKODE: The emergency departments of   private hospitals have turned out to be training ground for junior doctors, who are either pursuing their PG or just passed out of MBBS, who with their limited knowledge complicate cases through wrong diagnosis.

Since the state lacks a proper medical audit, many of their mistakes go unnoticed and  the  medically illiterate patient and family suffer.

Hospital sources say that the situation is worse during night hours as no senior doctors would be available in the emergency department to check the critical patients. 

“The  junior doctors seldom consult their seniors or do it only over phone. Their descriptions regarding the medical conditions of a patient would be based on the diagnosis that they have arrived at through primary examination and in many cases we have seen it going awfully wrong,” a senior doctor attached to Kozhikode Medical College told DC.

A 30-year-old woman who underwent  such a wrong diagnosis recently saved her health and money through a second opinion with a senior doctor at the Kozhikode Medical College.

“I went to the emergency department of a private hospital in the city with acute stomach pain. I had a previous infection of the appendix  and it was treated without  surgery two years back. I was given a pain killer and was asked to take an ultrasound sonogram when my pain subsided. The radiologist suggested that he could not see any contra indications that could suggest appendicitis and ruled out urinary stones as well. However, the junior surgeons at the emergency department were adamant to rule it as appendicitis and asked me to get admitted for an emergency surgery. Even my request to see a senior surgeon from the hospital was turned down,” Sannidha Hari, a native of Kozhikode said.

However, she insisted on  a second opinion and got discharged after signing a discharge against medical advice form at the emergency department. “They scared me  that I could die due to appendix perforation and advised me not to even drink water. However, when I took a second opinion from a senior physician from the Kozhikode Medical College Hospital and his surgeon wife, they ruled out appendicitis and said it was just pain out of colic,” she added.

“Only 50 percent of the surgeries that are performed at private hospitals are actually necessary,” the senior physician attached to Kozhikode Medical College said.