The Supreme Court on Friday directed the federal health secretary to personally visit Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) and conduct inquiry into the allegations that PML-N MNA Faiz Muhammad Khan died there because of negligence of the doctors and submit report by December 16.
A three-member bench of the Supreme Court comprising Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, Justice Chaudhry Ijaz Ahmed and Justice Khilji Arif Hussain ordered this while hearing a suo motu notice taken on an application of Raja Muhammad Ilyas, a relative of the deceased and protocol officer of the Federal Government Services Hospital, also known as Poly Clinic.
Appearing on a notice, Acting Executive Director Pims, Dr Altaf Hussain told the court that he had voluntarily resigned from office due to pressure from different quarters. But he could not elaborate on that. Presenting a confusing and unsatisfactory report, he said when the MNA was brought to the hospital the duty time of doctors was over. He said as soon as he was informed about the MNA, he rushed to the hospital.
However, he did not speak about the condition of Faiz Muhammad Khan on his arrival. The Chief Justice observed that an elected representative of thousands of people had lost his life due to negligence of Pims doctors. When a parliamentarian was treated in this way, what would be the sufferings of a common man at the hands of doctors, the CJ said, adding that it was height of maladministration.
According to relatives of the deceased MNA, he had been running with fever and suffering from chest pain in Abbottabad for a week. Not satisfied with his treatment at Ayub Medical Complex, the kin decided to come to Islamabad and accordingly arrangements were made for him at the Poly Clinic. But the ambulance that brought him from Abbottabad on December 7 took him to the Pims instead.
The MNA died within two hours of arrival due to carelessness and non-availability of senior doctors and a ventilator, they alleged. Ilyas, a relative of the deceased parliamentarian said, "I reached Pims at 4:55pm on learning that he had ended up there and found him lying in officers' ward in serious condition. But the junior doctors attending to him did not treat it as an emergency.
Even the pressure of the oxygen cylinder connected to the patient was low. "Our pleas to call in senior doctors were ignored. Our desperation increased as Faiz started gasping. A ventilator was finally brought for him but he was already dead," he said. Minister for Science and Technology Azam Swati also arrived to see Faiz, his cousin, he added. According to the Pims authorities, the MNA was brought to the Courtesy Centre of Pims, meant for VIP patients, and not to the emergency ward.