Hospitals turn away Epileptic teenager

A 14-year-old epilepsy patient, who was shunted from one hospital to another and is awaiting care at the state-run JJ Hospital, presents a grim picture of the city's poor healthcare system. Marling Ratgal, a teenager from Nashik, who suffers epileptic seizures, has been shunted around city hospitals for a brain scan, thanks to administrative apathy and infrastructural lacunae.

Marling has suffered seizures for the past two years. "He suddenly blanks out. He gets nearly 48 seizures in a day," said Shivrai, his father. A beneficiary of the Employees State Insurance Scheme (ESIS), Marling should have received treatment at an ESIS hospital, but the Ratgals have not been so lucky. "He was admitted to an ESIS hospital in Nashik but doctors said they did not have facilities to treat him," says Shivrai.