“Beware! Many people carrying fake identity cards and without uniform are looting patients and their relatives claiming themselves to be the hospital staff,” says a notice board outside the outpatient department of Govind Ballabh Pant hospital in central Delhi.
Such warnings have saved many patients from being cheated at the hands of touts.
“The government guidelines say hospitals are supposed to keep the patients informed about such malpractices. Therefore, we have put up this notice at various places in the hospital," said Dr Ashok Khurana, medical superintendent of the hospital.
Recently, cases of fake doctors and touts have been reported from Ram Manohar Lohia hospital and All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). In AIIMS, Jai Chaudhary cheated patients for eight years, before he was nabbed by police after another doctor raised an alarm suspecting Chaudhary’s moves.
Harish Goswami was apprehended from RML, who used to take money from patients to provide faster services in the hospital. He even used to refer them to diagnostic clinics outside.
GB Pant hospital started putting up notices after a patient registered a complaint with the authorities in 2010. “A patient complained that a staff member had cheated him of his money. We inquired and found out it was someone from outside. Following the incident, we put the posters all over the campus,” said Dr Khurana.
He added that a lot of patients who visit government hospitals are from outside the city. “Many of them are illiterate and do not know much about the city and its hospitals. They can be cheated easily. We need to inform them about touts,” he said.
