We believe that in Doctor-Patient relations, patients are inherently vulnerable. Hence they need to be protected with the help of a legally enforceable Standard Charter of Patients' Rights.  Establishing patient rights will impact our health care system in a significant and positive way.

Rights are correlated with both duties and responsibilities. All hospitals should adopt such a Standard Charter of Patient's Rights, display it in the local language(s) in a prominent location in the Hospital, make copies available on demand, ensure its observance, and orient their staff for the same.  Patients should know how and where to report any denial of these rights by a doctor, nursing home, hospital or other health facility  We suggest a participatory redressal mechanism in the form of district level committees, with representatives from the government, hospital owners, medical practitioners, and consumer and health organisations, that any aggrieved persons could approach if required.  Medical staff or institutions found to be violating these rights should be subject to a fine or cancellation of registration following the norms stipulated in the Amended Bombay Nursing Home Registration Act. 

In this context there is a need for effective legal provisions to protect patients' rights. The Maharashtra state legislative assembly amended the Bombay Nursing Home Registration Act in December 2005 to pave the way for mandating minimum standards to be followed by nursing homes/hospitals with the objective of ensuring minimum quality health care. But minimum quality does not only mean minimum space of the nursing home, nurse to patient ratio etc. Such standardization of physical norms is incomplete without standardization of processes including observance of some basic norms to respect patients' human rights. Hence a Charter of Patients' Rights has been included in the 2006 draft BNHRA rules (Section 16, Rule 14). These draft rules which have been on the Maharashtra Government's web site since July 2006 (pdf from maha-arogya.gov.in ) have been prepared through several rounds of discussions in which representatives of doctors' organizations participated. Given all this background, we request you to give final approval to the above mentioned draft rules, including the complete Charter of Patients' Rights given in the July 2006 draft.

We look forward to your early response to make Patients' Rights a reality for the people of Maharashtra, and thus set an example for the country.