Litigation

Rhode Island Hospital Operates on Wrong Side of Brain Again!

By Michael Kaplen

Unbelievable, but for the fourth time neurosurgeons at a hospital in Providence Rhode Island operated on the wrong side of a patient's brain.  It was the third wrong site operation this year! The Rhode Island Department of Health reprimanded the Hospital yesterday, and fined it $50,000.  Hardly sufficient in my opinion for such inexcusable conduct.

The incident at the Providence hospital occurred Friday, when a resident, a doctor in training, began drilling into the right side of the patient's head during a bedside procedure. A CT scan had shown bleeding on the left side of the patient's brain. The resident realized the mistake, closed the initial incision, and performed the procedure on the left side.

State health officials had ordered the hospital on Aug. 2, 2007, to improve its procedures, because of a pattern of wrong-site surgery dating back to 2001. This latest incident is the hospital's fourth wrong-site surgery in six years, all involving brain operations.

While it may be difficult to believe, surgery at the wrong site for unnecessary surgery because of the reading of the wrong slides or wrong x rays is a frequent cause of medical malpractice litigation.

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Full post as published by Brain Injury News and Information on November 27, 2007 (boomark / email).