‘Charges against hospitals false’

PATNA: Principal secretary of state health department R

K Mahajan

on Monday said reports that eight patients died at Darbhanga Medical College and

Hospital

(DMCH) due to alleged transfusion of expired blood and one at Shri Krishna Medical College and Hospital (SKMCH) in Muzaffarpur due to lack of oxygen supply were “totally false”.

“A six-member team headed by Dr R D Ranjan, director-in-chief of state health department, has submitted its report to the government after inspecting the two hospitals. They found the charges against the two hospitals untrue,”

Mahajan

said. There had been reports that eight persons died at DMCH due to transfusion of expired blood.

Mahajan said blood is considered expired after a 35-day period. “The team inspected DMCH’s files from August 18 for the last 220 units of blood donated and found no anomalies. This clearly proves that deaths were not due to transfusion of expired blood,” Mahajan added.

The team also met the delegation of junior doctors, who denied reports that they had made allegations against the hospital’s blood bank. “We talked to 15 junior doctors of DMCH, who said they had not made any such allegation, either written or verbal,” Dr Ranjan said.

About the death of a six-year-old girl in SKMCH on September 8, Mahajan said there was adequate supply of oxygen at the hospital and the child, who was suffering from severe diarrhoea, died as she was brought to the hospital in a serious condition. “The girl’s parents have also accepted it in writing that shortage of oxygen was not the reason behind her death,” Mahajan said.

He added that the health department has asked all hospitals to keep sufficient stock of oxygen in the wake of Gorakhpur tragedy in which at least 60 children allegedly died due to shortage of oxygen at Baba Raghav Das Medical College. “The hospitals in the state have been asked to keep 50 to 200 cylinders in stock, depending on the requirement. If the hospitals fail to abide by the directive, criminal case will be lodged against them,” Mahajan said.