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Footballer’s death: Madras HC denies bail to two doctors
The two doctors — orthopaedics assistant professor Dr A Paul Ram Sankar (34) and Periyar Nagar Government Peripheral Hospital casualty medical officer Dr K Somasundar (34) — who were suspended on November 15 a few minutes after Priya’s death, have claimed innocence.
The Madras high court on Friday refused to grant anticipatory bail to the two suspended government doctors in connection with footballer R Priya’ death. Justice A D Jagadish Chandira adjourned their bail pleas by two weeks to allow police time to investigate.
The two doctors — orthopaedics assistant professor Dr A Paul Ram Sankar (34) and Periyar Nagar Government Peripheral Hospital casualty medical officer Dr K Somasundar (34) — who were suspended on November 15 a few minutes after Priya’s death, have claimed innocence.
They cited the success rate of their surgeries for seeking bail. As per the petition, Dr Paul performed two similar surgeries in first fortnight of November and Dr Somasundaram did three surgeries during the same period and the five patients are normal. As per the doctors, they performed the ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) surgery on Priya with their “fullest effort.”
The two surgeons, in their respective bail petitions which HT has seen, stated that they performed the surgery for one-and-a-half-hour with the help of two anaesthetists, a staff nurse, two operation theatre technicians which ended at 2.30pm on November 7. Priya’s condition, they say, was stable post-op so she was shifted to the ward. Both surgeons were relieved from duty at 3pm after signing the hospital register.
The patient was subsequently supervised by an anaesthetist, they said, adding, ortho casualty medical officer Dr Harish and Dr Isiwarya were on duty and that a 24-hour anaesthetist Dr Thilak was also present.
“The petitioner (Dr Paul) did not perform surgery on the deceased but he was only to assist the Dr Somasundaram,” stated his petition.
“The petitioner has sufficient and excellent skill and experience in the field of surgery. The petitioner gave treatment surgery to the deceased for her knee arthritis/meniscus tear,” his bail plea stated.
On November 8, Dr Somasundaram was performing a total hip replacement surgery for another patient. He was called for assistance for Priya at about 12.30pm and since he could not desert the surgery, Dr Paul who was assisting him attended to her. Her pulse was found to be feeble and Dr Somasundaram advised a doppler scan which showed that there was less flow of blood in the arterial part of the vein, whereas venous flow of blood was not able to be detected.
Both doctors have said that following the surgery on November 7, “the deceased suffered very serious pain and was not properly looked after by extending immediate medical treatment on next day as requested by the doctors who performed the surgery...(they) advised to discharge and get Priya admitted in Rajiv Gandhi Government Hospital for further treatment as a case of necrosis was suspected, due to non-circulation of blood to the lower part of the knee and the surgery to remove the block was unavailable at peripheral hospital at Periyar Nagar.”
Priya, 17, was a first-year college student and a national-level football player who underwent an arthroscopy to fix a ligament tear on her right knee on November 7 at the Periyar Nagar government periphery hospital. She was in tremendous pain post-surgery and it was found that the blood circulation on her operated leg had been affected so on the hospital’s recommendation she was shifted to the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital on November 8 for advanced treatment. Here she underwent two surgeries, including an above knee amputation of her right leg but on November 15 morning she died due to multiple organ failure.
Minutes after Priya died, Tamil Nadu’s health minister M Subramanian admitted that it was due to medical negligence. The minister said that a committee formed by the government found that Dr A Paul Ram and Dr Somasundar were at fault adding that the compression bandage post-surgery was too tight which led to circulation being cut off.
