Dessy Sagita

Oversight of Indonesia's Hospitals Deficient: Expert

The public should not expect to receive better health care from hospitals, despite the intense public scrutiny of medical services following the controversial Prita Mulyasari case, a health analyst said.

“Hospitals can still do whatever they want,” Marius Widjajarta, chairman of the Indonesian Consumers Foundation for Health (YPPKI), told the Jakarta Globe on Tuesday.

“As long as our health services system is established by the hospitals and not patients, health services offered by hospitals will not improve,” Marius said, adding that medical centers could continue to face no sanctions for mistreating patients due to the severe lack of supervision by the Ministry of Health, which left them to do whatever they pleased.

The issue of institutional health care has come to prominence recently in the light of a case involving Prita Mulyasari, a mother of two, who sent an e-mail to 20 of her friends complaining of poor treatment she received at the hands of two doctors at the upscale Omni International Hospital in Tangerang. Omni filed a civil defamation lawsuit over the e-mail, while the doctors filed a criminal defamation suit against her.

“Prita versus Omni is only the tip of the iceberg. Such cases will continue to occur repeatedly until the ministry takes a firm stand to control both state and private hospitals,” Marius said, adding that Prita’s trial would most likely frighten members of the public into staying quiet rather than seeking legal action over malpractice.

“Every patient has a right to study his or her own medical records. But who would want to do this if they could end up in jail like Prita Mulyasari,” he said, adding that according to the law, hospitals must be able to produce the original medical records when patients request them, particularly once hospital bills have been paid.

“There should be no omissions in medical records, no additions or alterations for any reason.” Marius said, adding that Prita was courageous enough to speak up and demand her rights. However, he said there were many people who experienced similar problems but chose not to report the case or to seek justice because they were either too scared to take legal action or simply could not afford the legal fees.

Separately, Farid Hussain, director general of medical services at the Health Ministry, disagreed with Marius’s statement regarding the ministry’s lack of supervision of hospitals.

“We work hard to monitor and evaluate the performance of hospitals. This is why I am very glad if someone exposes a case. This provides us with information to work with,” Farid said, adding that Prita’s dispute with Omni stemmed from poor communication between the hospital, the doctors and the patient.

“Many of our hospitals are able to provide the best medical facilities for their patients, but communication with patients remains poor,” Farid said, adding that Prita would not necessarily have complained if Omni had paid attention to her demands as a patient, including her request to see her original medical records.

He said that under the Hospital Law, recently endorsed by the House of Representatives, medical centers were obliged to provide patients with necessary information, and any attempt to hide such information or mislead them with false reports could be considered a criminal offence.

“I believe our hospitals will learn from this and improve their performance. I don’t think any hospital would want to put itself into Omni’s shoes right now,” Farid said.

Though Prita lost the civil lawsuit and was ordered to pay a hefty fine, Omni withdrew the civil lawsuit against her on Monday after immense public pressure was brought to bear.

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