Surgeons quit Tata Memorial Hospital

mumbai: seven senior doctors have resigned from tata memorial hospital, the country’s leading cancer hospital, in the last few weeks. the hospital governing council’s decision barring doctors from private practice seems to be the critical factor behind this exodus. earlier, senior doctors had been allowed to devote 20 per cent of their time to private practice outside the hospital.the hospital, though public, charges a certain number of its patients. the council has also changed the formula for the distribution of income from these in-house private patients. the governing council’s new rules came into effect on april 1.some doctors, especially surgeons, are unhappy about the changes, which have reduced their monetary incentives. senior doctors were, in the past, allowed to maintain private practices in other hospitals because tata memorial could not accommodate all patients. the private practices also allowed tata memorial doctors to train and nucleate expertise in other institutes. “but the situation has changed and it is difficult to justify external private practices today,’’ says tata memorial’s director k.a. dinshaw. “our hospital has more beds and operating theatres now.we have many more patients, and we need our doctors to devote all their time to these patients. moreover, there are an increasing number of cancer specialists in other hospitals, so there is less need for our doctors to go outside.’’ as tata memorial is under the department of atomic energy of the central government, its mandate is to conduct research, education and service of patients. “private practices of surgeons cannot be our priority,’’ she adds. other doctors in the hospital, however, feel such a stand ignores market realities. “a surgeon in a private hospital can earn up to ten times what i get at tata memorial. let there be at least some proximity to what my peers are getting in the private sector,’’ says one doctor. some surgeons, who are comfortable with external private practices being stopped, are nonetheless agitated by the new formula which evenly distributes income from inhouse private patients. “with the new rules, the surgeon gets as much compensation from private patients as a pathologist or a radiologist. but a surgeon’s work is far more gruelling and time-consuming. moreover, all the legal responsibility of the surgery falls on the surgeon. the compensation should reflect this, rather than moving to an unreal socialist paradigm,’’ asserts a surgeon.