Professionals are individuals who profess any special skill or work, who are specially trained to profess in that field and bear the responsibility of professing with due care. Medical negligence is any misconduct or carelessness on the part of medical professionals say doctors for not providing proper care, which leads to the breach of their duties and leads to inconsequential damages. It's natural to mistake. While patients see the doctors as God and believe their illness would be healed and also the medication will heal them, often even the doctors make errors which may, in many cases, cost the patients a good deal. Sometimes the mistakes are so severe a patient will suffer immensely. Being in such a profession where patients are sick, ill, and patient belief his/her doctor as the Almighty, an implausible amount of care is required. This type of error is termed negligence. If a restaurant owner is sued for selling low-quality food, then a doctor may be sued for offering treatment and care of poor quality. Mistakes or incompetence within the Medical Profession can cause minor injuries or other severe forms of accidents, and sometimes even death may result from these mistakes. Because no man in this world is ideal, it's clear that an individual who is qualified and has knowledge of a particular subject can also make mistakes during his practice. To mistake is natural, but to repeat the same fault is incompetence due to one’s carelessness. The underlying explanation for medical error or medical negligence is that the carelessness of the said doctors or medical practitioners, which may be seen in various cases where due reck isn't taken during diagnosis, during surgery, and sometimes during injection, anaesthesia, etc. For example, after a patient’s operation, he's likely to become infected with several diseases because of some cause that will include blood loss, fatigue, high dose of medicines. In due course, the doctor is required to provide standard treatment for such infectious diseases with premedication. When a doctor refuses to try and do so when a patient suffers from any infection, which in extreme cases can cause serious damage or maybe death, the doctor is alleged to have committed medical negligence or malpractice.
Jacob Mathew v. State of Punjab [(2005) 6 SCC 1]
In this case, it was held that a practitioner joining a particular profession shall be believed to have knowledge of that discipline, and it shall be guaranteed, deduced by him, that a fair amount of caution shall be taken during professing his discipline. The person may be held responsible for negligence if he didn’t have the essential professional qualifications, or he failed to take a proper amount of care to profess the occupation. If a specialist fails to go through his/her training, a
specialist shall take reasonable care and possess expertise as compared to any practitioner within the same field. Certainly, the abilities of various professionals vary from one another although they work in the similar profession, but what’s needed is for a specialist to posses knowledge of latest technologies, innovations, and betterments in his field so as to provide critical care to his profession’s consumers. The failure to go with amounts to the legal responsibility for professional negligence.
Jagdish Ram &ors v. State of Himachal Pradesh(2008 ACJ 433)
In this case, the SC held that professionals such as lawyers, doctors, architects, and others are included in the category of those persons who are particularly skilled and trained in their respective fields in the negligence law. Any task or job requiring specialist ability is included in a profession. Every professional need a degree of knowledge of that particular branch of profession which he wants to join as his career and it is necessary that he should do his work with reasonable care. He assures his clients that he’ll do his job with proper care and caution but he doesn’t offer any guarantee of the result.
Essentials
Doctor’s duty to attend the patient with due care
Medicine is such a discipline that a practitioner is expected to have the required experience and expertise for the task and a medical practitioner is compelled to perform a fair duty of care when dealing with the patient. The quality of treatment is defined by the essence of the profession. The level of an average professional in that field will decide a surgeon or anaesthetist whereas in case a higher skill is needed. In the case of Sishir Rajan Saha V. The state of Tripura (AIR 2002 Gau 102), the physician didn’t pay enough attention to the patients in a government hospital as a consequence of that the patient died, the physician held responsible for paying compensation. It was held that If a doctor refuses to treat a patient admitted in an emergency condition under his supervision, and the patient dies or is a victim of complications that the doctor could have prevented with due care, the doctor could be held responsible for medical negligence. However, the doctor’s fault can not be used now and then, and he can't be held liable because of something went wrong. A very high degree of negligence was needed to show to fix the liability. A physician or medical practitioner owes them some duties while treating their patients, like Duty of care the patient, Deciding what treatment should give and Duty of care in providing the treatment.
Doctors Acting in a Negligent Manner
It is well-known that the concept of the res ipso loquitur is going to be implemented in cases of gross medical negligence. It's claimed that the res ipso loquitur principle is largely an evidentiary principle and the principle is supposed to help the claimant, res ipso loquitur means things represent/speak for themselves, when preferring the doctor’s responsibility, it must be known that the error detected should be a violation with reasonable care that a normal practitioner should have held. within the case of Jagdish Ram v. State of Himachal Pradesh (2008 ACJ 433), it was held that the chart giving details of the number of anaesthesia allergies of the patient should be listed before any operation so that an anaesthetist can supply the patient with required amounts of anaesthesia. Within the latter example, the doctor did not do so, and also the patient died from an overdose of anaesthesia, and therefore the doctor was held liable for the identical. within the case of Gian Chand v. Vinod Kumar Sharma (AIR 2008 HP 97), it was held that despite the necessity for urgent care to be provided to the patient leading to harm to the health of the patient, the patient’s doctor or hospital administrator was held liable for negligence.
Liability -
Civil Liability:
Civil liability typically requires lawsuits within the type of insurance for damages sustained. Whether there's some violation of the duty of care during the procedure or when the patient is under the supervision of the doctor or the health professional, they're held liable for any wrongdoing. they're liable within the variety of insurance for the damages. Often senior doctors also are held vicariously liable for the wrongs the junior doctors have done. If anyone may be a hospital employee, the hospital is liable if that employee damages a patient by behaving incompetently. within the case of M Ramesh Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh (2003 (1) CLD 81), the hospital authorities were found to be negligent, inter alia, in not keeping the toilet clean, which resulted within the patient falling into the toilet resulting in her death. The hospital was charged a compensation of 1 Lac rupees.
Criminal Liability:
There may be an instance when the patient died after the treatment, and a criminal case under section 304A of the Indian Penal Code is filed for allegedly causing death by the reckless or careless act. According to S. 304A of the IPC, whoever causes the death of any person by an act of rash or negligence not amounting to homicide shall be punished with imprisonment for up to two years or with a fine or both. Hospitals may be charged with negligence in transmitting infection, like HIV, HBsAg, etc., if any patient develops such infection in the course of hospital treatment and it is found that the same has occurred due to failure on the part of the hospital, then the hospital may be held responsible for lack of fair duty to care.
Other Liability:
In the case of Dr Suresh Gupta v. NCT of Delhi (AIR 2004 SC 4091), The SC held that the legal situation was very simple and well settled that if a patient died due to medical negligence, the practitioner was responsible for paying the compensation in civil law. Just when the negligence has been so serious, and his conduct has become as reckless as endangering the patient’s life does it enforce criminal law for the crime under section 304A of the Indian Penal Code 1860
Conclusion
As the number of cases in India and also the world at large, it's becoming a significant concern that the remedies should either be issued under the tort law and therefore the Consumer Protection Act of 1986 or that the time has come to enact legislation to remedy patients who have suffered seriously because of negligence on the side of doctors or medical authorities. Here are patients who have suffered from neglect but who haven't lodged a complaint either due to their own ignorance or due to lengthy proceedings etc. Not only this, but many doctors also give the patients medicines that are too strong. It can affect both their brains and their bodies. Typically speaking, these treatment deficiencies rarely get to the limelight. This need to be handled with caution. A doctor should be liable for the assorted compositions of the drugs that he prescribes. it's now time for a platform to be formed to produce these patients with the remedies easily. Yet that wouldn’t be done by itself. it's important to enforce it in its full swing by making the ways simpler and promoting it so people are conscious of their rights.
Sirachi Gupta, Faculty of Law, University of Lucknow
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