PESHAWAR, April 28: Several doctors have increased their consultation fee in clear violation of the government's directives, a survey revealed. More than a dozen consultants have increased their fee on their own, said a doctor.
The NWFP government had issued a notification to the teaching and district headquarters hospitals last year asking professor/consultants and district specialists to charge Rs250 and Rs150, respectively, as consultation fee.
The notification, Relief Package, issued on Oct 17 came after the cabinet granted approval of the move in its meeting on Oct 1. Significantly, some of the consultants at the Dabgari Gardens have increased their consultation fee from Rs300 to Rs400 in violation of the notification that had called for its reduction.
"Let alone the professors, even a senior registrar is charging Rs400 for a single visit from the patients. Two or three of the consultants at Dabgari Gardens received Rs500 from the patients. The doctors taking high fee include physicians and surgeons," said a radiologist.
"It is difficult for me to reduce fee. I charge Rs400, whereas patients in Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi pay Rs500 or even more to the consultants junior to me," said a senior consultant, justifying the raise in his fee.
The notification issued to the chief executives of the teaching hospitals and DHQs to implement it immediately has fallen on deaf ears throughout the province and the district specialists, who according to the directive, were required to charge Rs150 for a single visit from the patients had also been receiving Rs300 from them, said a district specialist.
Another district specialist told this reporter that they had sacrificed facilities in the city to serve at the district level hospital and were qualified enough to take Rs300 like the Peshawar-based consultants.
Not only that but the other directives issued in the same notification also remain far from implemented. The surgeons have been directed to receive Rs10,000 for major and Rs4,000 for minor operations at private medical centres.
The surgeons, however, argue that the directive regarding rates for operation is vague, because some operations are extremely minute, done under local anaesthesia in a few minutes and it is unjust to charge the patients Rs4,000.
Likewise, the surgeons say that the government has fixed Rs10,000 for major surgeries, which has also created confusion among the medical community. "All the operations carried out under general anaesthesia or full anaesthesia come under the purview of major ones, such as thyriodectomy, cholecystectomy, prostatectomy, etc., which consume over an hour's time of surgeons, while appendicictomy, heamorrhiodectomy, herniatomy, etc., also done under general anaesthesia, take 10 to 15 minutes."
A surgeon says according to the order the patients should pay Rs10,000 for these minor operations also, for which they are paying between Rs2,000 to Rs5,000 at present. "This is not a relief package because it will further benefit the surgeons," a surgeon remarked.
Furthermore, the doctors had also been asked against the installation of diagnostic facilities in their clinics but many of the physicians, surgeons, gynaecologists, etc., have been performing ultrasound examination on the patients, charging an additional amount of Rs300 besides their consultation fee.
District specialists, who had been instructed to shift their clinics outside the DHQs, continue to practice inside the premises of the DHQs. "We serve the patients round-the-clock. It is in the interest of the patients to run our clinics inside the hospitals," said a district specialist.