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Hospital Bills Cancer Surgery Not Performed
13 Sep
Summary
- Activist Reji Abraham was billed for cancer surgery he did not have.
- The hospital attributed the error to a non-medical staffer's mistake.
- Abraham has lodged complaints with multiple regulatory bodies.
An environmental activist, Reji Abraham, has alleged that Criticare Hospital in Malad erroneously billed him for a cancer surgery that he did not undergo. Abraham had a hernia surgery on September 1, with his insurance company providing pre-approval for Rs 95,500. However, during discharge, hospital staff claimed an additional cancer surgery had been performed, increasing the bill to Rs 2.02 lakh.
Abraham stated that he never had a cancer consultation or diagnosis, and the procedure included was an omentectomy, which can be used for both cancer treatment and complex hernia repairs. The hospital attributed the discrepancy to an inadvertent human error by a non-medical TPA executive who mistakenly selected the wrong procedure details during billing.
Following the error, the hospital eventually charged Abraham only Rs 75,000. While the hospital founder described it as a miscommunication, Abraham's operating surgeon initially called the incident negligence, later rephrasing it as confusion. Abraham has lodged formal complaints with the Maharashtra Medical Council, insurance regulator Irdai, BMC, and state public health departments.
