Live broadcast of surgeries faces ban

For the past few years, live broadcasting of complicated surgeries from private hospitals to CME programmes, have become normalized.

Hyderabad: The practice of live broadcasting of surgeries from operation theatres of private hospitals, where senior surgeons showcase their surgical skills, to convention halls of star hotels during Continuing Medical Education (CME) programmes, could be a thing of the past.

For the past few years, live broadcasting of complicated surgeries from private hospitals to CME programmes, have become normalized. Almost all major conferences that feature top surgeons from India and abroad invariably have live sessions where the entire surgery is broadcasted live. In fact, there have been instances where hospitals tend to line-up a series of surgeries that are beamed across multiple sessions during the course of the conference.

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In recent months, however, questions have been raised over patient safety and the process of acquiring consent to broadcast the surgeries live from patients and their relatives. In fact, complaints have also been raised with National Medical Commission (NMC), the regulatory authority of medical education in India, over such practices.

Some of the complainants have also taken legal recourse by approaching courts by contending that private hospitals were commercially using patients for their motives by broadcasting surgeries live in conferences.The NMC has received complaints that private pharmaceutical and medical equipment manufacturers, who usually fund CME conferences, make use of such broadcasts to promote their brands among the audience, which invariably consist of young and upcoming surgeons.

Senior doctors familiar with the issue here said that such practices happen at the cost of patients and their relatives, who usually are kept in dark on their right to know about live streaming of such surgeries.

“Health care facilities showcase their capabilities, surgeons flaunt their skills and companies promote their products all at the expense of patient safety. Advertising sponsorship and professional showmanship overshadow the true purpose of these broadcasts,” the complaint to NMC contended.

Following such complaints and even court orders, recently the NMC has swung into action and has constituted a committee of experts to give recommendations on the issue of live surgeries that are broadcast by private hospitals in the country.