Cheating patients in the name of better treatment

BOGRA, July 25: A lot of private hospitals, clinics, nursing homes and diagnostic centres have mushroomed across Bogra district including 12 upazila towns promising better medicare facilities to patients but many of them are actually unauthorised and poorly equipped with wrong treatment.

In these medical institutes, many general practitioners in the name of 'specialist doctors' are cheating the patients and charging exorbitant consultancy fees.

Besides, they also prescribe a series of unnecessary pathological tests for which they get huge sum of money as commission. Doctors at the private sector get 35-45 per cent commission from diagnostic centres for referring patients, they added.  

These ordinary physicians, having no special qualifications as required for, are earning thousands of taka everyday and thereby simply cheating with the patients.

On the other hand, the genuine specialists are also being cheated by them. Even some hospitals and clinics in the district are being run by 'fake' doctors in dirty environment and almost having no equipment.

Besides, some doctors at district and upazila hospitals remained off-duty during office hours and patients are suggested to go to private clinics and diagnostic centres or chambers.

Many doctors of public hospitals from adjacent districts regularly visit different private hospitals and clinics in the district towns every weekend as specialist doctors.

A patient Sohel said, "The doctors who come from Dhaka, are not specialists but only general practitioners. Due to the organised activities of these agents, hundreds of poor and helpless patients and their attendants are being cheated and losing huge sum of money." he added.  A mobile court led by executive magistrate Farzana Ferdous Zaman fined Tk 40 thousand from Supreme Diagnostic Centre near Bogra-Naogaon highway recently.

The executive magistrate said, "The date of the hospital's licence was also expired long ago but not renewed." The Civil Surgeon said, "We will take action against illegal clinic and hospital very soon."

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