Seven Hills Hospital

While the hospital has inpatient, outpatient, CGHS scheme tie up and also tie up with insurance companies, a feedback from the patient compelled to write a review of the hospital activities. A feedback as received is quoted below:
"Seven Hills Hospital operating from Andheri East Mumbai is one of the biggest and super speciality hospital of the city working on Public Private Partnership (PPP) model is supposed to be patient friendly and protecting all consumer rights as required by law by following fair practices. But it is not . We are not talking about how the VIP celebrity patients like Amitabh Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan were treated but how the common patients are treated by the hospital.
i) A patient who had undergone a major surgical operation ( “Prostatomegaly”,costing about 2.75 lakhs with five days stay) is denied a recorded DVD of the entire surgical procedure . The hospital did not have the courtesy even to respond or give reason on his written request for not providing the same. This is against the basic right of a patient to get all records documentary or electronic , concerning to his paid treatment , as enshrined in medical ethics, MCI rules etc. Since the hospital is accredited by the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals (NABH),a complaint was lodged with them also. Instead of replying to the patient earlier, Hospital replied to NABH that in all surgeries they do not record the procedure, unless asked before hand by the patient. Our enquiry reveals that almost all reputed Mumbai hospitals record such surgical procedure and give to the patient when demanded. Assuming there are post-operative complications and the patient wants to seek a second opinion if the surgery was performed as per quality norms, how the patient is going to prove the absence of those norms or proving Doctor’s omissions in absence of the actual record? In any case, was not it the duty of the Hospital to give this reason to the patient when he had asked ?
ii) The hospital wilfully defied the law by charging a whooping sum of Rs.44 for 1 ltr. Mineral water bottle having MRP as Rs. 20. A blank Invoice stationary paper signed by someone without mentioning name or designation was issued to get away from prosecution. Similarly one medicine was also charged more than MRP. Hospital admitted this in reply to NABH that this was an ‘Inadvertent Mistake’ of overcharging committed by them.
iii) In past the Hospital Pharmacy’s licence was cancelled for a few days by the Foods and Drugs Commissioner as a punishment for not dispensing the quantity of drug as prescribed by the doctor . For instance against the prescribed quantity of one tablet, the patient was compelled to purchase the entire rapper of tabs and pay for it .
iv) However, the most foul and unfair practice of making easy extra money was proved on record when the disposable items used during surgery were charged for separately under MEDICINES such as Plastic Aprons ,Hand Gloves , Urometer. Instead of charging the Equipment use relating to Cystoscopy in Operation theatre charges, it was charged separately as an extra Equipment Usage charge. AS these are non-allowable items, the TPA rightfully refused to pay this aggregated amount of Rs.3124 (this includes Rs.980 for use of special Equipment) but Hospital deducted this sum from the deposit kept by the patient. This amounts to fleecing of patients. Assuming, such a special equipment was indeed used in operation process, in absence of the record (DVD) and justification, this can not be verified and claimed by the patient.
v) Another unfair practice resorted to by the Hospital was to give a bill to the patient at the time of discharge by showing an enhanced amount of Rs.1500/- under the head “Doctor Consultation”, whereas in the bill claimed from TPA, the same amount was shown less by Rs. 1500/-. When asked by the patient to clarify this discrepancy, the hospital did not care to reply. But to NABH ,it explained that the bill given to the patient was interim but in the final bill sent to TPA, while checking one extra visit of Doctor was deleted .. This is an incorrect excuse. The patient claims that at the time of discharge when he came to the billing department to sign the bill as required by the TPA condition, one day extra stay and some amount of food items when objected,were deleted; but no amendment was done in the amount in Doctor fees. "
While above is the feedback from a public domain, there were some feedback traced on other public domain. Such feedback contains mix of opinion. A newspaper covering case in High Court also appeared in The Indian Express dtd. 12/01/2012 and some of the observation made by the HC is quoted below:
"In the affidavit filed by Dr Santosh Salagre, who was appointed as officer on special duty (OSD) by the corporation pursuant to a High Court order, he has stated that the action of the Seven Hills Hospital staff is "totally inhuman and unethical" as patients referred from BMC hospitals and their families "face the worst time of their lives" at the hands of the hospital staff. "Their acts/omissions have been totally shocking and no person, let alone a medical professional, can do so even with their enemies," Salagre's affidavit states."

With above in view the hospital is being rated accordingly.