The parents of a 9-year-old boy from Thane's Shahapur have alleged that doctors at the local sub-district hospital performed a circumcision instead of a leg surgery on their son. They have filed a complaint with the hospital and local Shahapur police, stating that the doctors got confused as they operated on three patients of similar age on the same day.
The doctors, however, claimed they were right in performing the circumcision along with the leg surgery as the boy had phimosis (tight foreskin). According to the family, the child injured his leg while playing with his friends last month and developed an infection near the cut. The family admitted the child to the hospital on June 15, where a doctor named Swapnil performed the operation.
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The child's mother said, "When the doctor brought my son out of the operation theatre, my son told me that the doctor operated on his private part instead of his leg. When I asked the doctor about it, he hurriedly took the child back to the operation theatre and operated on his leg."
When the family questioned the doctor, he said the child would be fine. The family refused to take the child home until the hospital gave them a written assurance that nothing would happen to their child.
Following the family's complaint, activists from the city have taken up the issue and demanded action against the doctor responsible for the alleged operation mix-up. Gajendra Pawar, the health officer of the sub-district health hospital in Shahapur, said, "Apart from the injury in the leg, the child also had a problem of phimosis which is why we operated on his penis."
When asked about the family's complaint that they were not informed about the circumcision before the operation, Pawar said that different relatives of the patient stay in the hospital, and it is possible that they did not understand. "But since the family has complained, the civil surgeon's team will investigate the matter," he added.
The civil surgeon of the Thane Civil Hospital has initiated an inquiry following the parents' complaint. The family lives in Saravali village in Shahapur; the father is a daily wage laborer, the mother is a domestic help, and the boy is a student.