Bill passed, private hospitals now on a tight leash

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata/bill-passed-pvt-hospitals-now-on-a-tight-leash/articleshow/57457578.cms

KOLKATA: Dubbing it a "historic" move and "a model for India", CM Mamata Banerjee on Friday steamrolled opposition apprehensions to make private healthcare facilities accountable. Pleading passionately in favour of reforms in the sector, that she felt ought to be more affordable, fair and accessible, Mamata termed Apollo Gleneagles's decision to remove CEO Rupali Basu a vindication of her stand against unscrupulous clinical establishments and proof that her government has taken the right step.

"All's well that ends well. This shows that private healthcare needed this cleansing," Mamata said in the assembly.

The soon-to-be-law makes overbilling, refusal to treat accident victims, and holding on to bodies over non-payment a crime, which can even lead to a three-year prison term.

"I spent six long hours with my colleagues to frame this bill," the CM said, stressing that the law will be reformatory and not merely punitive.

The commission's powers have triggered apprehensions among hospitals. The latter fear that the new set-up loads the dice against them. Doubts have also been raised about the ambit of its functioning and whether the existing arbitrating bodies will cease to exist.

According to sources, some private hospitals are seeking legal opinion to examine whether the bill only adds to create a mesh of cross-regulatory laws which can hold up during judicial scrutiny. This, however, can only be known once the state rolls out the rules.

Mamata's point-by-point rebuttal of the opposition was also peppered with personal anecdotes. She recollected one incident when an MRI report of her's had detected an appendix that she had got removed long back.

The bill now calls for fixed rates and charges for hospital packages covering the entire gamut of medical treatment from investigation, bed charges, surgeries, ICU charges, ventilation, implants and doctor's consultations. It allows the hospital to charge more but only as a percentage of the initial estimate given to the patient's kin before. Inability to pay bills shouldn't stop anyone from getting life-saving treatment, the bill proposes. Hospitals, however, can recover their dues legitimately.

The West Bengal Health Regulatory Commission will be a quasi-judicial body and appeals against its decision can only be made to the Calcutta high court, even the apex court.

Any private hospital with over 100 beds should have a fair price medicine shop and a diagnostic centre. Any private hospital which has received government help shall treat 20% of its OPD patients 10% of its indoor patients free of charge. Other hospitals should do it as part of their corporate social responsibility (CSR).

The unanimity in the ruling and opposition benches to pass the much-debated West Bengal Clinical Establishments (Registration, Regulation and Transparency) Bill, 2017 resonated a growing public perception.

Arguing the fast-paced approach leading from her February 22 dressing down to the passage of the bill on Friday isn't a knee-jerk approach, Mamata said, "We had conducted a detailed survey for the past one year. Nine hundred private hospitals and nursing homes were covered. In the Sanjoy Ray case, bills ran up to Rs 7.45 lakh. In another case, bills had run up to Rs 9,62,716. The hospital received three cheques of Rs 5,97,716. For the rest they took their ancestral property documents, PAN card. Never heard of such things in my life! In another case, a patient, Abhisikta Banerjee, was charged charged Rs 24,500 for a medicine which costs Rs 10,000," she said.

"From inflated bills to negligence in treatment to lack of transparency to serious gaps in communication to unnecessary retentions in ventilation and life support systems, the complaints we were getting against private hospitals and nursing homes about harassment of patients and their families were very, very huge," she said.