Ambulatory Surgery Center Tampa (Google Maps)
A Florida colonoscopy patient’s screams of pain went unnoticed because his 84-year-old doctor didn’t have his hearing aid on, a medical board determined.
According to an administrative complaint by the Florida Department of Health’s Board of Medicine, Dr. Ishwari Prasad on June 5, 2023, conducted two subpar colonoscopy’s procedures at Ambulatory Surgery Center Tampa. The complaint says Prasad is “hearing impaired and uses assistive hearing devices to able to effectively communicate with his surgical team and patients.” However, Prasad allegedly was not wearing the hearing aid during one or both of the procedures.
During the procedure for a patient identified in the complaint as R.F., Prasad allegedly inserted the scope inside of him before he was fully sedated. Prasad did not stop the procedure when “it became apparent that Patient R.F. was not fully sedated.”
“Respondent fell below the minimum prevailing professional standard of care by performing a colonoscopy on a patient that had not been fully sedated, and/or by failing to utilize his assistive hearing devices resulting in not being able to hear the patient,” the board wrote.
After Prasad inserted the scope, the patient “began yelling.”
The octogenarian doctor also was unable to effectively communicate with his staff during the second procedure, according to the complaint. During the second procedure, a hospital administrator told Persad to stop but he leaned over the patient and shouted “I know” and kept inserting the probe, the Miami Herald reported.
The board also determined that Prasad delegated to a surgical tech several tasks that the tech was not licensed to complete.
Persad committed “medical malpractice,” the complaint said.
In the order finalized on Aug. 7, the board put Prasad on probation, imposed a $7,500 fine, required him to reimburse the department over $6,300 for the cost of the investigation and to have another physician supervise his gastroenterology procedures. He also must undergo an evaluation to determine his “clinical competency.”
According to the Florida Department of Health, Prasad earned a PH.D. in microbiology in the United Kingdom in 1967 and his MD in Mexico. He began practicing medicine in the United States in the early 1980s.
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