Apollo Hospital, Banerghatta Road - An experience with death after Coronary artery bypass graft(CABG)

This is my experience of a life time, I wanted to share with people who might not have such experience or planning to go under the knife for Coronary artery bypass graft. The intention is to make people aware so they don’t go through what I did.

It all happened when my father was diagnosed with blocked coronary arteries and was researching for a doctor who can perform a bypass/CABG. We happened to meet several cardiologists but we were looking for a surgeon. The one we met in Apollo Hospital, Bannerghatta Road, was a famous MICS surgeon.

We discussed with the surgeon and asked for alternative to operation.  He said medicine is not an alternative but death if not operated at the next available slot and sighted examples of big and famous people dying due to delay in operation (Smart Talk Trap). Incidentally, he claimed to be the 2^nd best in India, only one in south India and we fell into the trap.

The take away:

-          19 days in ICU

-          19 days of follow up and mental agony

-          13 lacs of Apollo Bill

-          One lifeless body

A person, who was doing all sorts of things on his own, became sick after operation that was supposed to recover him from blocked coronary arteries but met death in 19 days. The said surgeon even lacked guts or courtesy to meet deceased attendant/family. A junior doctor met us and said sorry.

After 18 days of ICU treatment with the so called best MICS surgeon and best hospital in South India, one fine morning, I got the shock of my life. I could not react, became a rock without any emotion, the God became non-existent and I have to carry the guilt for the rest of my life for taking a wrong decision and snatch the life of a healthy person for the sake of treatment.

On 19^th day, I was told that the patient was cardiac arrested, what time? No one knows. What is the cause? Whether the CABG was successful? If so, why did he go for a redo surgery after a day? Many questions remained unanswered. The surgeon said after the redo that that he has an infection and he is yet to improve. What is the infection? All the culture reports (sputum, blood, urine, etc.) came negative, then what else? The surgeon told us, the patient is being administered the best antibiotic available in medical history but many people die every day because of unknown infection.  The cause mentioned in the death report is sepsis, the best ever excuse for a doctor and to avoid a case medical negligence/incompetency.

Involved doctors
Satyaki Nambala
Dharmesh Agarwal

In competency at its best:  All of the days in hospital, I struggled to find what is the diagnosis, whether the patient is improving, etc. I never got a clear answer from any of the people involved. What I was told that the doctor will visit during ICU visiting hours and you have to wait to talk to him. When I picked the surgeon to discuss, he pointed to pain management specialist and that confused persona kept me saying, we are trying. It’s difficult to understand what the specialization of this pain management specialist is but he was involved all though the ICU stay and I never saw a cardiologist or any other specialist near patient/attendant. What an irony! What a pain to the people who pay money for the treatment so in turn these guys can feed their family and maintain their living standards.

These dignified plumbers only know the work of assembly line. They follow the certain procedures, they do know how to run the procedure but don’t know how to deal with the complication if that arises after the procedure, neither have a brain to think out of box nor involve the master of trade as that is derogatory for them. The hospital neither takes cognizance of the patients dying due to incompetency of its doctors nor designed a board to get the best help when situation arises. They only recognize money and can take the chance with the life a patient but they don’t want to learn. God may forgive the folks of their misdoing.

Glorified brothers/sisters: Whenever I met duty doctors in ICU to get some explanation, I was getting contradicting opinions. One very common thing with dignified plumbers and glorified brothers/sisters that they get irritated if you try going into details. Even once the pain management specialist raised his voice as my wife wanted to know more. Just imagine, how these people exploit patients and their family. They make money, perhaps whatever way possible, but care a damn about patients. Perhaps, a doctor’s performance/remuneration is evaluated based on the total amount of money he makes for hospital. They care least about patients and their life.