Pandemic, Delayed Hiring at Medical Council lead to 100 pending medico-legal cases

As a result, there are around 100 pending cases that Council still needs to decide, reports TOI.

The State Medical Council operates as the apex medical body in that particular state. Among the numerous responsibilities bestowed upon the medical council, its ethics committee in particular deals with the adjudication process- especially regarding the medical negligence cases.

Also Read: 22 Medico legal cases pending with Telangana state medical council, reveals RTI

As per the latest media report by the Times of India, the ethics committee of Telangana State Medical Committee is not fully functional, which has ultimately led to a huge pendency of cases.

It is the state government that nominates six persons for the Medical Council. Further, two members are nominated by the Kaloji Narayana Rao University of Health Sciences and four ex-officio members are automatically in the committee by their position.

All the members are divided into management committee, finance committee and the ethics committee of the medical council.

However, in case of TSMC, the term of the previous committee has been over on November 2, following the order of the court.

Speaking about the matter, the former chairman of TSMC, Dr. E Ravinder Reddy told TOI, "We served for five years. After the court order, we stopped going to the council. There is still a court case going on to decide whether the elections should be held for 5 or 13 members. Ex-officio committee members that comprise of director of medical education, director of health, commissioner of AP Vaidhya Vidhana Parishad, vice-chancellor of health university are still in the committee."

"We had to stop the physical hearings as the Covid may spread due to the crowd," he added.

As the council has no provision for online hearing of the cases, around 90 to 100 such complaints are pending with it.

While commenting on the matter, the registrar of TSMC, Dr. Chennamaneni Hanumantha Rao told TOI, "Around 90 to 100 complaints are pending with us. There were no hearings due to the Covid-10 pandemic. Even as the pandemic situation has eased, there is no ethics committee to hear the cases. We are waiting for the government to nominate the members."

"We have also received complaints from patients, who said that they were overcharged in hospitals. However, overcharging and billing doesn't fall under our purview. Ethics committee only deals with medical negligence and misbehavior," he further mentioned.