Software glitch hits patients in medico-legal cases hard

Manish Sirhindi

Tribune News Service

Patiala, February 9

The official software used to enter details of the medico-legal cases crashed this morning, causing harassment to hundreds of patients across all civil hospitals and medical colleges in the state.

Patients suffered as their diagnosis such as X-ray, CT-scan and ultrasound could not be conducted without uploading the details online.

While the doctors gave them initial treatment, further diagnosis could not be done as it is mandatory to upload case details online before going ahead with the medical investigations.

It is learnt that a large number of patients were seen waiting in emergency wards of the state hospitals, while their attendants and, in some cases, police officials were made to stand in queues to get the details uploaded for hours together.

A senior doctor at Government Rajindra Hospital said the software was never up to the mark and it crashed this morning. After waiting till afternoon, the doctors decided to complete the formalities manually and go ahead with the treatment, he said.

Dr DS Bhullar, general secretary, Punjab State Medical & Dental Teachers Association, Patiala, said the doctors had written to the state nodal officer on the matter, but to no avail.

Dr Rajiv Joshi, head, forensic medicine, Faridkot, said work to complete online formalities was affected. Dr Rakesh Chopra of Jalandhar Civil Hospital and Dr Ashok Channa of Amritsar also said the development caused much harassment to patients as well as doctors.

State nodal officer Dr Gursharan Singh said the matter had been taken up with the National Informatics Center (NIC) and efforts were on to revive the software.