Private hospitals draw criticism over increasing C Sections in Telangana’s Adilabad

The government has issued stringent norms against the hazardous practice and raids are being conducted on the hospitals

Adilabad: Private hospitals are drawing flak for encouraging women to prefer cesarean (C) section operations over normal deliveries even as the government has issued stringent norms against the hazardous practice and raids are being conducted on the hospitals.

Officials say there were 11,579 deliveries from January 1 to December 31. Of them, 6,610 were normal deliveries, while 4,969 were cesarean sections. However, private hospitals accounted for 3,003 C-sections, while government-run hospitals saw 1,966 operations, indicating an unwelcome trend.

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“Private hospitals persuade pregnant women to opt for C Sections citing risks and other health complications. Hospitals can easily fleece the innocent patients by performing surgeries,” an official said.

Some hospitals charge anywhere between Rs 25,000 and 50,000 for a surgery. Additionally, patients spend around Rs 20,000 for medicines, equipment needed for surgery, etc. The cesarians, however, result in financial burden on the poor families.

“It is a relatively safe operation. However, it can cause possible complications including infection, damage to internal organs, an increased risk of respiratory distress for babies and complications with future pregnancies for women,” a gynecologist from Mancherial opined. She added that caesarian modern medical intervention was required to tackle some critical deliveries.

When asked, District Medical and Health Officer Dr Narender Rathod said that steps were being taken to reduce C sections in private and government-run institutions. He stated that a meeting would be convened with the managements of the private hospitals soon and action was going to be initiated against errant nursing homes for unnecessarily performing C sections.

The officials further stated that the district was recording a dip in the operations when compared to the previous year. They informed that the district saw 91 per cent of C sections in private hospitals in 2023 and 85 percent of operations in 2022. They noted that awareness was created among the women over the adverse consequences of the method.