Clinical Establishment panel to urge pvt hospitals for discount on medical bills
Kolkata: The West Bengal Clinical Establishment Regulatory Commission (WBCERC) may serve notice on the top private hospitals in the city, urging them to provide 10 percent discount to the patients on their medicine bills.
The WBCERC has taken the decision to aid the patients and their family members who are often burdened with a huge medicine bill in the private hospitals. People will be immensely benefitted if the private hospitals formulate any policy to introduce discount system on the medicine bills.
According to a senior official at WBCERC, a notice has already been served to a top private hospital in this regard. The authorities of the private hospital have been requested to provide discount on medicine bills. The commission will issue notice to other hospitals as well, requesting them to consider the proposal. If the private hospitals do not provide the discount, they will have to allow the patients and their family members to buy medicines from outside markets, the official said.
"We will soon issue notice to all the top private hospitals in the city, requesting them to introduce discount system on medicine bills of the patients. Otherwise, they must be allowed to buy medicines from the outside shops. One hospital has already been served notice," the official said.
The state government has set up a number of fair price medicine shops in the city, where the patients get medicines at discounted rates. The patients availing treatment at the private hospitals are being deprived of the facility.
If the private hospitals allow their patients to buy medicine from these shops, they would be benefitted, maintains the official. Following Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's instruction, WBCERC was set up in 2017, to fix accountability on the private hospitals in the state and the doctors.
The Mamata Banerjee government is the first state government that had come up with the idea of constituting the regulatory commission to provide a platform to the people who often face problems at private hospitals and nursing homes, during the treatment of their patients.
The patients or their family members who are dissatisfied with the treatment at any private hospital can register complaints with the commission.
It conducts a thorough probe and fixes accountability on the private hospitals. It also imposes fine on the hospitals if negligence is found on their part.
The Chief Minister had earlier given a message that healthcare service is not a commercial proposition and services should be delivered to the people with a humane touch. The commission also checks whether the private hospitals overcharge the family members of patients in any way.
