"I have made dozens of rounds of the District Administration Office (DAO). But I have neither received the compensation nor does the doctor appear when summoned by the DAO," KC said. She got the apex court´s verdict after more than seven years of legal battle but the verdict has yet to be implemented. [break]
Public prosecutor at the Kathmandu District Court Yadav Prasad Poudel claims to have written several times asking the hospital and the doctor to appear before the DAO to pay compensation, without any response. "I will write one last time, if they do not respond then I will write to the police to bring them here," Poudel said.
Similar is the case of Basanta Malla, who was relieved after the Kathmandu District Court ordered Om Hospital and Research Center to compensate him for the death of his wife due to the hospital´s carelessness seven years ago.
The court said the hospital kept his wife Saroja at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), which didn´t have a ventilator. She was admitted to the hospital for treatment of a severe form of pneumonia. The court found the hospital and the doctor guilty for not referring the patient to other hospitals with ventilator facilities.
The hospital was ordered to pay Rs 500,000 to the family of the victim while the doctor concerned, Ugra Narayan Pathak, was ordered to pay Rs 12,000 for the medicine expenses incurred.
Eighteen months on, the hospital has recently challenged the district court´s verdict at Patan Appellate Court saying that the court became emotional and issued the verdict. Malla has yet to get any compensation.
In a similar manner, Nissar Ahmed has also been denied compensation imposed by the District Compensation Committee of Nawalparasi on the Prithvi Chandra Hospital, Ramgram in the district after his wife died six days after delivering child at the hospital. The Butwal Appellate Court dismissed the compensation committee´s decision of a compensation of Rs 45, 000.
These are just a few representative cases of how victims of hospital´s negligence are denied any compensation. "The lengthy legal process related to compensation on consumer issues wears down the victims," says Jyoti Baniya, the general secretary of the Consumer Rights Protection Forum (CRPF). He said almost all such cases related to hospitals and doctors end in some sort of reconciliation, but the victims never get compensation.
"Even the apex court´s verdict has not been implemented even one year since the decision," Baniya added referring to the case of Srijana KC.
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