Appointment With a Deceased Doctor: What Patients Should Know
A resident of Liepāja said on social media that her specialist appointment was tied to a doctor who has died. TVNET+ looked at who is responsible for the patient in such a case.
A resident of Liepāja, a city in Latvia, has described on Facebook a situation in which a patient waits for an invitation to a specialist consultation that never arrives. The woman had not received any notice about a visit, so she phoned the medical institution to find out why.
During the call she learned that her appointment had been linked to a specific doctor who had died. The queue in which the patient was registered was therefore no longer active, yet nobody had informed her.
Questions raised by the case
In connection with this case, TVNET+ examined several questions that matter to patients:
- who is responsible for a patient when the doctor they were booked with is no longer working;
- whether the hospital is obliged to offer another specialist;
- whether the patient can keep their previous place in the queue.
The case shows that a patient who waits a long time for news about a visit may need to contact the medical institution directly and check the status of the appointment.
