Mar 02, 2013 10:12 PM
9895 Views
(Updated Mar 04, 2013 04:47 PM)
I recently(in Jan'13) got operated for my Kidney stones by Dr Piyush Tripathi(Urologist in Ved Kidney Health Clinic) in Kanpur. I chose the place because Kanpur is my hometown and I wrongly assumed that Doctors in Kanpur would be more human than in a metro(or in Gurgaon, my work place). Earlier I only used to hear about Doctors being money-minded but this was my first-hand experience of a doctor who started talking about money from the word go till the time he has to provide the final bills(for which I am still running from pillar to post)
When we(myself and my father) met him on Day 1, and while still discussing how severe my kidney stone problems could be, he was more interested in explaining the package of the treatment and why he has to charge this much. He has done some 4-5 yrs specialization course, fees for which was very high and he has to recover the same very soon somehow. We agreed to his PACKAGE(including hospital+ spinal anesthesia+ doctor fee) fee. Obviously someone has to pay for his investment!
Dr Tripathi also took us into the confidence that a particular hospital is the best place to get the operation done since he has been using their operation theater for so long and the staff is respectful to his commands(although he gave us the option of other hospitals as well but I would be surprised if someone would take the risk of going against the preferred advice of the doctor!). Later on, we realized that this hospital is under his control in terms of the maximum share(of the package) he can pocket at the cost of decent facility(dirty linen, lack of attention from duty doctors/nurse) for rest of our stay.
Worst part came on to the day when I was on the operating table(half conscious) and he again started explaining his costs and showing off his hi-fi instruments. I was aghast by his eagerness to justify his costs instead of focusing on his work!
Then he called my father into the operation theater(during the operation) and started showing the LIVE operation on monitor and again trying to justify his fees!
Until now it was a hilarious incident for me, because I thought I was having a first hand experience of a rotten state of affairs and I thought this Doctor is one of its weird kind.
Next day when I felt better and wanted to leave the hospital as soon as possible, he insisted us to stay till the evening so that his package(of 2 days hospitalization) can be justified. But we checked out of the hospital very next day. But since he still has to charge the package amount so hospital added some additional fuel charges to meet the package amount!
Another funny thing, there were some left-over( unused) injections which we wanted to return. Since the hospital did not accept them back, Doctor ordered to nurse to inject it right away! Obviously, we did not allow that and threw away the injections which were actually no more required.
Finally came another twist in the story when we asked for the bills(we had informed the doctor that we will require these bills for medi-claim). We received the bills and submitted the same to medical insurance company and later realized that it was not an official bill but just "Provisional". Date of admission/discharge was no where mentioned on the Discharge Card. Obviously, my claim got rejected. Of course, it was our fault not to check it at the time of discharge but this was my first time to get operated and then we also made the mistake of trusting the doctor too much and his recommendations blindly.
After 3 weeks, when I called up Dr Piyush Tripathi for an appointment for stent removal(which was inserted during the operation 3 weeks earlier), and requested if I can get it removed in Gurgaon itself instead of coming to Kanpur, first thing I heard form him was that it would be very costly to have it removed in Gurgaon and go and check some of the hospitals(again justifying his fees for stent removal(a 10 mins procedure), although our understanding was that it was the part of the package itself)! Anyways, I gathered some courage and found another Urologist in Gurgaon itself, who charged the same amount which Mr Tripathi was asking!
When we came back and complained with the hospital and asked for the actual bill we were surprised to know that almost 75% of the money had gone into Doctor's pocket which was mentioned as 50%(in the provisional bill) at the time of discharge. Anyways that was their prerogative, how they distribute the bounty. We were more concerned about Total Bill(package amount), so that we can claim the same. After a lot of argument, hospital issued the fresh bills for their share.
Interestingly, Doctor Tripathi refused to recognized us on phone or refused to meet without the proof that he had operated upon me and made "NO effort" to ask the hospital or my patient ID and make our life easy.
Till now, we have only got the bill(of 25% amount) from the hospital and Dr Tripathi is too busy to issue the bill of his share, since he is busy attending his new set of patients(or customers, since he is a more of a businessman than a doctor)
Today as well, while we have waited in his clinic to meet him for more than 2 hours(we went after taking appointment from his assistant while he was in the clinic), he left early and did not show up! This is after we had paid everything right at the time of discharge!
While we can very well understand the busy life of a doctor who apparently operates more than 5-7 patients in a day and must be making a decent money to recover his INVESTMENT, a little bit of professionalism and humility will only help him and his patients.
Hope he learns that soon and God bless him, while we would learn to live with the frustration, bad experiences and hope for a better tomorrow!
