Indian court orders doctors to improve handwriting

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has directed doctors to ensure their handwriting is clear and legible.

The ruling was given by Justice Jasgurpreet Singh Puri during hearing of a case pertaining to sexual exploitation, cheating and forgery. During proceedings, the judge reviewed a medico-legal report submitted by a government doctor and found the handwriting impossible to decipher.

The order noted: “Not even a word or a letter was legible.”

Justice Puri observed that the continued reliance on handwritten prescriptions was difficult to justify. “At a time when technology and computers are easily accessible, it is shocking that government doctors are still writing prescriptions by hand which cannot be read by anybody except perhaps some chemists,” the court said, as reported by the BBC.

The judge instructed authorities to introduce handwriting training in medical colleges and directed that digitised prescriptions be rolled out within two years. In the meantime, doctors have been told to write in clear, capital letters.

The Indian Medical Association (IMA), which represents more than 330,000 doctors nationwide, welcomed efforts to improve the legibility of prescriptions.

Dr. Dilip Bhanushali, the IMA’s president, told Reuters that digital prescriptions are increasingly common in urban hospitals. But he acknowledged that poor handwriting is still widespread in rural areas where doctors often see overwhelming numbers of patients.

“A doctor who sees seven patients a day can write clearly,” he explained. “But if you see 70 patients a day, it becomes difficult.”

This is not the first time Indian courts have raised the issue. Judges in Odisha and Allahabad have previously criticised what they described as “zigzag” and “shabby” medical handwriting.