The court of the city of Linz in Austria fined a surgeon 2700 euros (about 227 thousand rubles) who mistakenly amputated the patient’s right leg instead of the left, and the mistake was discovered only two days later. The widow of the patient, who died before the hearing, was also awarded 5,000 euros in compensation, reports AFP.
An 82-year-old man (his name and the name of the surgeon are withheld) was admitted to a hospital in the city of Freystadt in May of this year. He was scheduled to have his left leg amputated, but for some reason the surgeon marked his right leg and successfully performed the operation. The error was not discovered until two days later, during the dressing procedure, and the patient was informed that he would have to undergo another amputation.
In response, hospital officials said the incident occurred “due to a combination of unfortunate circumstances,” and the chief physician issued a public apology. However, the case went to court, where the surgeon claimed that the reason for the error was that the procedure itself was flawed in the operating room. When asked why she marked the right leg for amputation instead of the left, she replied, “I don’t know.
The surgeon was transferred to another hospital and payment of half of the fine was deferred. The hospital reported that the circumstances of this medical error were carefully reviewed, organizational conclusions were drawn, the actions in the operating room were discussed, and the medical staff received appropriate training. We explain quickly, simply, and clearly what happened, why it matters, and what happens next.
The number of offers should remain: episodes. The end of the story. Podcast Advertising. Similar incidents in medical practice are extremely rare, but they have happened in the past. In 1995, an American surgeon realized in the middle of an operation that he had amputated the wrong leg of a diabetic patient. Since he had already successfully severed almost all of the muscles and tendons, he had to complete the amputation anyway. This happened at the University Hospital in the city of Tampa, Florida, USA.
The surgeon, Ronaldo Sanchez, who was 50 years old at the time, revealed during the ensuing investigation that a critical error was pointed out to him in the middle of the operation by a surgical nurse who accidentally discovered it while reviewing the documentation. “She was shaking her head and crying. That’s when I realized what had happened,” Sanchez recalled at the Select Committee hearing. In July of the same year, his medical license was temporarily revoked, but in an entirely different case: while working at another hospital some time ago, he amputated a patient’s toe without her consent.
In his defense, Ronaldo Sanchez said that it was impossible to save the finger and that the decaying tissue posed a threat to the patient’s life and health. In addition, according to the testimony of other members of the surgical team, the finger was practically separating from the leg due to the dead tissue. As far as anyone can tell, this case wouldn’t have had much impact on the doctor’s career, but amputating the wrong leg became a serious offense. The patient later had his leg amputated at another hospital.
Dr. Sanchez was ordered to pay him $250,000 from his own income, while the patient received an additional $900,000 from the university hospital where the medical error occurred.