Delhi AIIMS Doc Who Shared IVF Eggs Sans Consent Let Off With Warning

An All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) doctor has been let off by the National Medical Commission (NMC) with a warning for giving some eggs of a patient undergoing IVF treatment to two other women without her consent. 

The warning was issued on July 18, noting that the doctor had contributed immensely to the field of reproductive medicine.

Delhi AIIMS Doctor Let Off With Warning

The order read that, in spite of the fact that the act was done in good faith to help poor patients without acquiring any personal gain, it was undeniable that the guidelines of the ICMR were violated. So the doctor needs to be more careful in the future.

The doctor appealed to the National Medical Commission after the Delhi Medical Council (DMC) ordered the suspension of her licence for one month in September last year.

According to the complaint received by the NMC in 2017, 30 eggs were retrieved from the patients on August 12, 2022, for an IVF procedure.

Dr Girish Tyagi, secretary of DMC, said the doctor had allegedly taken 14 eggs out of the 30 from the embryologist and provided them to two other patients without the consent of the women. The disciplinary committee of the DMC investigated the complaint.

Following the investigation, the DMC noted that sharing a patient’s egg or oocytes was illegal and unethical, as sharing or donating of this nature is prohibited by the ICMR guidelines. With no written consent from the donor or the recipient, according to the guidelines made to the Delhi Medical Council, it was an illegal and unethical act.

The AIIMS conducted an internal inquiry into the matter and submitted a report dated August 30, 2017, highlighting the lapses committed by the doctor.

It was also submitted that the doctor was initially appointed to the Department of Reproductive Biology and was then transferred to the Gynaecology Department against the recruitment rules.

The document also claimed that the doctor shared the eggs in the best interest of the recipients, as both of them had failed multiple IVF cycles in the past. She had done so without comprising the outcome of the patient from whom the eggs were taken.

Confirming the decision of the disciplinary committee, the DMC noted that, given the gravity of the lapse committed by the doctor, the punishment of warning awarded by the disciplinary committee "will not serve the interest of justice."

Hence, the council directed the punishment to be enhanced to the removal of the doctor’s name from the State Medical Register of the Delhi Medical Council for a period of 30 days on September 19, 2022.

The doctor then appealed to the NMC on October 3 of the same year, seeking to quash the SMC’s order. In her appeal, she stated that the procedure of egg retrieval, fertilisation, and sharing was done by the entire IVF team in consultation with all stakeholders, including the treating doctor, and was also recorded in the lab documents in a transparent manner.

The Ethics and Medical Registration Board of the National Medical Council held a meeting on October 18 last year, accepted the appeal, and granted a stay on the DMC’s order. Following an inquiry and a hearing on May 24 of this year, the NMC let off the doctor with a warning.

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