Advocate Birender Sangwan’s whose PIL led to slashing prices of cardiac stents this year in February is again planning to file another set of PILs at the Delhi High Court (HC) against hospitals on whom complaints of overcharging have been received at the drug pricing regulator National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) office.

The landmark verdict was a huge relief for many cardiac patients across the country as the ceiling price of bare metal stents was brought down to Rs.7,260 from Rs.45,000; and that of drug eluting stents were fixed at Rs.29,600 from about a whopping Rs.1.2 lakh. Clearly there was much profiteering happening on the sale of stents.

Says Advocate Sangwan, “We will be filing PILs against all the hospitals which have figured in the NPPA’s list for violating the ceiling price order dated February 14, 2017.”

On February 14, NPPA announced cut in prices of coronary stents by up to 85% by capping them at Rs.7,260 for bare metal ones and Rs.29,600 for drug eluting variety.

The step was taken to fix a standardised specification of stent and its MRP to stop fleecing of patients. NPPA had written to all the chief secretaries to ensure compliance of stents price capping, its availability and uninterrupted cardiac care services. The government brought in important reforms such as the National List of Essential Medicines (NLEM) in 2011 and also issued the Drug Price Control Order (DPCO) in 2013.

However, Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently in its verification reports have ascertained that no hospital in Mumbai, Pune and Nashik were found violating the ceiling prices for cardiac stents as stipulated by the drug pricing regulator National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA).

The state regulator had stepped up its vigilance as a part of its larger plan to detect overpricing of stents in government and private hospitals subsequent to NPPA receiving complaints about stents being sold at higher prices at KEM Hospital, Lilavati Hospital and a few hospitals in Pune and Nashik.

Two complaints of overcharging had been received against the KEM hospital. The first complaint was received on February 26, followed by another complaint on March 1, 2017. The other hospitals include Lilavati Hospital, Bandra, the complaint of which was received on February 23, 2017 and Bhaktivedanta Hospital, Mira Road, Thane, the complaint of which was received on March 4, 2017.

Two other hospitals in Maharashtra include Pune Hospital and Research Centre, Pune, the complaint of which was received on March 4, 2017 and Six Sigma Medicare and Research Ltd, Nashik, the complaint of which was received on February 25, 2017.

On February 26, the official Twitter handle of NPPA tweeted that a complaint was received against Anand Hospital (Meerut), Uttar Pradesh and Mumbai’s KEM Hospital.

Prior to this, complaints were received against Bharat Heart Institute (Dehradun), Uttarakhand, Oxygen Hospital (Rohtak), Haryana, Max Hospital Saket, New Delhi, Nidaan Multispecialty Hospital (Sonepat), Haryana and Lilavati Hospital, Mumbai. New Delhi’s Max Hospital and Nidaan Multispecialty Hospital from Haryana.

NPPA has directed hospitals/nursing homes/clinics utilizing coronary stents shall specifically and separately mention the cost of the coronary stent along with its brand name, name of the manufacturer/importer/batch number. and other details, if any, in their billing to the patients or their representatives.