Patient's kin at PMCH to get death certificates same day

Patna: In a bid to provide relief to the relatives of the deceased patients, Patna Medical College Hospital (PMCH) announced that death certificates will be issued to relatives of the patients immediately who died during treatment along with the patient's body. The service will start from October 20. 

Earlier, family members of the deceased had to wait nearly six months to get a death certificate or had to appease the hospital staff to obtain the certificate of their kin. However, except in medico-legal cases, or those involving post-mortem examination, the relatives of the patients would get the certificate immediately. The direction to execute the service was given by Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav.

Patna Medical College, Patna was established as Temple Medical School in 1874 with the admission of 30 students with fees of Rs. 2/- only per student for the whole course. It is considered one of the oldest institutions in the state and records an average of 15 deaths of patients every day.

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While speaking with HT, Medical Superintendent Dr IS Thakur said, "Issuing death certificate used to take up to six months earlier. There were even allegations that middlemen, in connivance with some of our staff, used to demand illegal gratification from the relatives of the deceased to issue death certificate."

"I issued orders on Monday and all heads of departments have been told to ensure that death certificate is issued expeditiously to relatives of the deceased patient along with the body. Our deputy chief minister, during his surprise inspection of the hospital on September 6, had issued instructions that relatives of patients who die be given death certificate from the hospital the same day," said Dr Thakur.

"Our patient mortality rate could have been better if patients came to us early for treatment, and not referred from private health centres at the end stage. Most patients come to our hospital when they are either terminally ill or have run out of finances after incurring a hefty amount of money on treatment at private centres," he added.

The superintendent said he had also issued a similar instruction to his officials around a fortnight back to issue birth certificates of children born at the hospital promptly.

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