Smt. Savita Garg vs The Director, National Heart Institute on 12 October, 2004
The Apex
court in Savitha Garg v. National Heart Institute reported in Supreme Court and National Commission on
Medical Negligence and Insurance under Consumer Protection= IV, (2004) CPJ 40
(SC) emphasized that the burden
of proof shifts to the doctors when there is a prima facie case to prove that
treatment was done according to standard normal procedure. In the instant case, there is a prima facie
case which shows that the patient died due to Septicemia within two weeks of
the surgery conducted by the opposite party hospital. The patient was 50 years
old, her coronary angiogram report did not express any major risks, her L.V.
function was normal, she had normal renal function as reflected in her ultra
sound scan of the abdomen, her blood investigations prior to the surgery were
also showed normal results and she developed omittings which later depicted
that the patient suffered from Malaria, Septicemia or infection of the blood
and it is the for the opposite parties to explain as to how the patient who did
not suffer from any high risk medical ailments before the surgery ultimately
died within two weeks of the surgery with septicaemia. Merely stating that the patient is a woman and has left main stenosis is not a specific
ground for the sequence of events and the post operative complications that
followed. It is for the hospital and the
doctors to explain as to how a cardiac patient developed Malaria which further
led to sepsis and renal failure in the intensive care unit of their
hospital. The very fact that the patient
contracted Malaria in the ICU evidences low hygiene conditions in the opposite
party hospital. It is not as if the
patient died of cardiac complications for which she was admitted in the
opposite party hospital. To reiterate, she was admitted for cardiac
surgery but died within two weeks of sepsis in her blood which clearly evidence post operative
complications which only the doctors could explain and in the instant case they
have not been able to establish the same.