Kolkata: The West Bengal Clinical Establishment Regulatory Commission (WBCERC) on Wednesday imposed a penalty of Rs 10,000 on Med Polis Health Plus in Kasba for its involvement in “unethical” practice.
The WBCERC said that the Med Polis Health Plus which is a medicine shop with an OPD clinic put out advertisements attracting patients for pathological tests without having any proper license for doing so. On the basis of a complaint registered by one Sharmi Guha Thakurata, the WBCERC carried out a hearing and learnt that Thakurata took her patient to the Med Polis Health Plus for consulting a doctor. After the doctor made a recommendation to take an USG test, the medicine shop persuaded the patient saying that they were offering a package for carrying out USG.
The patient had therefore booked a slot against Rs 50. On the designated date, the patient went to the shop for USG test and found that a car was parked outside the medicine shop for ferrying the patients to another clinic for tests. Guha Thakurata refused to go to another clinic and registered a complaint with the WBCERC.
During the hearing, the Med Polis Health Plus told the commission that they have a pharmacy license and they also run a polyclinic. As they have some tie-ups with pathological centres, they publish advertisements to attract patients for a clinic test. The WBCERC however found this totally illegal and cautioned the medicine shop saying strict action will be taken if any such incidents happen in the future. The commission also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on them.
In another case, the WBCERC asked Durgapur Mission Hospital which had allegedly denied Swasthya Sathi treatment to a patient from Malda and treated him as a cash patient to take back an earlier bill and prepare a Swasthya Sathi bill as the patient’s wife was unable to pay the bill. The patient had however died.