The New Nation - Internet Edition

Our Correspondent, Rajshahi

The joint forces in special drive against unauthorised business of clinics, pathologies and nursing homes in Rajshahi in three days till on Wednesday jailed one clinic owner and arrested five persons including a Rajshahi Medical College (RMC) Professor for illegal practices.

The team consisting of metropolitan magistrate Rabiul Alam, Lt Col Muhammad Aminul Islam and Major Abdullah Al Baki also sealed off five private clinics and collected over Tk 5 lakh in fines from different clinics and pathologies.

The mobile court of metropolitan magistrate Rabiul Alam with the joint forces jailed Mustafizur Rahman, one of several owners of Al Arafa Clinic for one month and fined the clinic authority of Tk 50,000 for different irregularities including running the clinic with forging documents.

The arrested persons include Dr Abu Raihan Khondoker, an Associate Professor of Bio Chemistry department of RMC. He was arrested from Lesar Diagnostic Centre after joint forces seized a number of blank papers of pathological reports carrying Raihan's signature.

Sources in the joint forces said, the clinic authority used to cheat patients by giving medical investigation reports at their will using Raihan's pre-signed papers. Dr Raihan was, however, granted bail from court later.

Other arrestees include lab assistant Mirajul and technologist Shahadat of Lesar Diagnostic Center, Dolphin clinic manager Badiuzzaman and laboratory assistant Lutfar Rahman.

The pathology of Al Arafa Clinic, Laboratory and X-ray sections of Ekota Clinic, x-ray unit of Lab Fair, Amina Clinic and Garib-e Newaz Clinic at Talaimari areas were sealed off during the raids.

Sources in the joint forces told reporters that the operation was still going on. Lesar Diagnostic Center was fined with Tk 1 lakh, Dolphin clinic was fined with Tk 2 lakh while Rajshahi Cancer Hospital was fined with Tk 40,000, Janata Clinic with Tk 60,000, Jana Sastha Clinic with Tk 20,000, metro diagnostic center with Tk 50,000, and Seba Nursing Home with Tk 20,000.

During the raid, the joint forces warned some other clinic authorities for shunning unauthorised practices. The raiding officials said, situations are worse than expected after similar raids in June last.

Some organisations are running pathologies and laboratories without any approval while a few have any skilled technicians for performing critical medical examinations.

Most patients of these clinics and pathologies were given wrong treatments that sometimes caused deaths. A few those who have approval were not following rules of functioning properly.

Many of the clinics employed brokers for hiring patients.

The sources also said, nearly 150 clinics were operating unabatedly in Rajshahi for years despite government approval was given to only 31 clinics and 24 diagnostic centers. The raiding teams also advised government doctors and medical staffs for not being concerned with such unregistered organisations.