Patient loses voice, Supreme Court orders Manipal hospital to pay Rs 10 lakh

Feb 22,2024

Bengaluru: The Supreme Court directed Manipal Hospitals on Old Airport Road to pay Rs 10 lakh in compensation, along with 10 per cent annual interest, to the wife of a man, now deceased, who’d developed hoarseness in his voice owing to negligence on the part of the hospital while he was administered anaesthesia for a surgical procedure in 2003.

Ulsoor resident J Douglas Luiz underwent a major surgery on his left lung at the hospital on October 31, 2003.

However, after the surgery, he developed hoarseness in his voice, which, the operating surgeon said, could have been caused due to the excision of a tumour, along with lymph nodes, around the Recurrent Laryngeal Nerve. He assured the patient that he would regain his voice within eight months with nebulisation and voice therapy.

However, there was no improvement in the patient’s condition. Subsequently, Luiz consulted two other doctors in the field, who said there was a dislocation of his left arytenoid process that had happened due to wrong intubation during administration of anaesthesia for the surgery.

Following this diagnosis, Luiz moved the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum in Bengaluru, alleging medical negligence. On May 10, 2006, the consumer forum accepted his application and ordered Rs 5 lakh compensation, along with Rs 5,000 in litigation cost.

On August 24, 2007, the Karnataka State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission upheld the award and on November 15, 2017, the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) also confirmed the same, keeping the compensation amount unchanged.

Meanwhile, in 2015, Douglas Luiz passed away. Subsequently, his wife challenged the NCDRC order in the Supreme Court, seeking Rs 18 lakh in compensation, claiming that her husband was deprived of promotion and his career suffered due to the hoarseness in his voice. Luiz had practically lost his voice and his career hit the doldrums since 2003, with him stuck with the same designation and same pay of Rs 30,000 per month, until he died, his wife claimed.

In its defence, Manipal Hospitals claimed the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum had erred in discarding the evidence of the doctors who had said that there was no negligence while administering anaesthesia to the patient through a double lumen tube during the surgery.

Source: Healthworld