Telangana medical council summons hospital medical superintendent, doctors for conducting activities ‘for quacks’ — again

This was not the first time the council cracked down on the hospital for the same reason: The TSMC pulled up the Continental Hospital in January last year for organising an event for registered medical practitioners (RMPs).

The TSMC Act does not consider RMPs to be fully-qualified doctors. Instead, they are deputed to primarily provide medical help like first aid in rural areas.

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What the letter said

The TSMC, in its letter to the hospital, said it was writing to its management “over the activities of your hospital is conducting for quacks”.

The council described it as a “most unethical situation and unpardonable condition” that violated the rules of the National Medical Council (NMC), the national regulatory body that regulates medical education and medical professionals.

The TSMC said the NMC was very particular on cracking down on such illegal activities by hook or crook.

It said this was the “second time you are encouraging the quackery with ulterior motives” that were “detrimental” to society.

Hence, the TSMC had summoned the MS or in-charge of the hospital along with Dr Jagannatha Rao, Dr Raghu N Reddy, and Dr Guru N Reddy — who spoke at the event — to appear before its Ethics Committee on 28 February.

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The event

The “unethical” event the TSMC was pointing to was a cancer awareness programme that was conducted on 18 February.

According to the hospital’s official social media handles, it was an awareness session on gastrointestinal, stomach, liver, colorectal, and pancreatic cancers.

Given the scope of what RMPs are qualified to do in Telangana, their presence at such an awareness programme would be considered an anomaly by the TSMC.

This is where the mention of the “ulterior motives” in the council’s letter could come into play, with it possibly suspecting that the hospital could be using this event to get the RMPs to do something unethical on the ground.