City doctor barred for lending signature without checking reports

Delhi Medical Council is a statutory body with powers, duties and function of regulating the practice of modern scientific system of medicine in the NCT of Delhi.

A city-based pathologist, who used to be a professor at Delhi government’s Maulana Azad Medical College, has been debarred for a year by the Delhi Medical Council (DMC) for allegedly failing to discharge his duties and jeopardising the safety of the patients.

His name has been removed from the state medical register, without which no doctor is allowed to practice anywhere in the state.

The action was taken after a sub-divisional magistrate (SDM) came across a “shabby lab” during his field visit at New Kondli, East Delhi in February. On enquiring, the lab owner, who is also the lab technician, claimed he had been paying Dr RK Bhatnagar R 2,500 per month for using a scanned copy of his signature on the lab reports.

“Dr RK Bhatnagar has been indulging in professional misconduct by issuing pathology reports under his signature without supervising the conduction of the pathology/ biochemical tests or visiting the pathology lab,” read a DMC release.

“After the inspection, the lab was sealed. Tthe reports that were present at the lab were taken by the SDM. He then filed a complaint with the DMC. During the hearing, the owner of the lab said he would issue reports that were normal without consulting the doctors but show the reports that seemed abnormal. But several of the reports seized by the SDM were abnormal and yet had been issued with the doctor’s signature without consultation,” said Dr Girish Tyagi, registrar and secretary of DMC.

This is not the first time the doctor has been debarred. “In 2013, Dr Bhatnagar’s name was removed from the State Medical register for two months after it was found that lab reports were being issued on his name by a quack,” said Dr Tyagi.

“During his hearing in 2013, the doctor had admitted that he was visiting 20-25 labs, none of which he could name, meaning he was allowing them to use his name,” said Dr Tyagi.

“I have been visiting this lab. And, in the past, the quack where my certificate was found, had a photocopy of it. Anyone can get a photocopy like that. This is defamation by the DMC and I have filed a case in the Supreme Court,” said Dr RK Bhatnagar.