Biggest mistakes by Doctors
Sometimes even the most routine surgical procedure can go catastrophically wrong. Here are 7 of the most famous medical mistakes of all time that will make you stand up and take notice.
1. Brain surgeries on the wrong side of the brain: In 2007, Rhode Island Hospital initiated brain surgery three times on the wrong side of the patient’s head, all within a timespan of less than a year. The first instance happened in January when a third-year resident didn’t mark the place where he was to put a drain in a senior patient’s head. When questioned later, both the nurse and the doctor said they did not receive training in how to use the required pre-op checklist that would help eliminate mistakes like this one. In July, an experienced surgeon neglected to write on the consent form which side of an 86-year-old man’s head he would operate on to remove a blood clot. When a nurse questioned him about it, he insisted that he was sure on which side he must operate. However, though the patient’s head was marked, it was marked on the wrong side. The third instance happened in November when although the hospital’s chief neurosurgery resident and the nurse discussed beforehand which side of an elderly patient’s head to operate on, the doctor marked and cut into the wrong side and for reasons unknown, the nurse did not stop him.
2. Wrong heart-lung transplant: In 2003, 17-year-old Jésica Santillán died after doctors at Duke University Hospital made a fatal error in her heart-lung transplant. At the age of 12, Jésica was diagnosed with restrictive cardiomyopathy, which means she suffered from an enlarged, weakened heart and malfunctioning lungs. After a long wait, Jésica was finally to receive her new organs and rebuild her life. However, instead of giving her a heart-lung transplant with her Type O blood, doctors gave her organs with Type A, and her body rejected them. Over the next few days, Jésica suffered repeated seizures, was on life-support, and her new heart began to fail. After the doctors had attempted a rare second transplant with organs of the correct blood type, her doctors declared her brain dead and removed her from the respirator.
3. The wrong testicle removed: In 2007, Benjamin Houghton, aged 47, underwent surgery to have his left testicle removed at the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center because it was atrophied, painful and could harbor cancer cells. However, doctors removed his healthy right testicle by accident, thereby depriving his body of testosterone and putting him at risk of health complications like sexual dysfunction, depression, fatigue, weight gain and osteoporosis. In addition to removing the left testicle, the surgeon John T. Leppert was supposed to perform a vasectomy on the right side for the purpose of birth control. Mr. Houghton filed a lawsuit for $200,000 for future care and unspecified damages.
4. The wrong leg amputated: At the University Community Hospital in 1995, Dr. Rolando Sanchez amputated his diabetic patient Willie King’s left leg below the knee, instead of his right leg. Sanchez learned of the mistake when a nurse checked some paperwork mid-way through the surgery. However, by this time, he was already cutting through the patient’s muscles, tendons, and ligaments, and had no other choice but to continue with the procedure. According to Sanchez, both the blackboard listing out the day’s surgical procedures as well as the surgery report by accident listed removing the left limb. However, the patient consent form had the correct information listed. It is only after this incident, though, that doctors were required to check the consent form. Mr. King, who later had his lower right leg amputated at a different hospital, received a settlement of $900,000 from the University Community Hospital and $250,000 from Sanchez.
5. Fertility clinic used wrong sperm samples: When Thomas and Nancy Andrew’s baby Jessica was born, they noticed that the baby’s skin was much darker than their own. However, their doctor assured them that the in-vitro fertilization procedure was executed properly and the condition was normal. In fact, according to court papers, the doctor assured the parents that the baby’s color would ‘get lighter over time.' However, one home test and two professional tests later, it was confirmed that Mr. Andrews was not Jessica’s father. As a result, in 2007, the couple sued the fertility clinic for medical malpractice along with other offenses, on the grounds that the clinic mixed up sperm samples and used another man’s sperm to inseminate Nancy Andrew’s eggs.
6. 13-inch surgical instrument left inside the patient: Donald Church underwent surgery at the University of Washington Medical Center (UW) in the year 2000 to remove a large malignant tumor. However, when the surgeons finished the procedure, they accidently left a 13-inch surgical instrument inside Church’s body. According to Church, the pain never went away after his surgery to remove the tumor, and affected his ability to function normally and return to work. When he came back to UW for his 30-day checkup, the surgeons informed him that the pain he was experiencing was normal, and was a consequence of his extensive surgery. However, at his wife’s urging, he visited his family physician at UW Clinic three weeks later who asked him to get a CAT scan done, at which point the image of the retractor appeared. Over two months after the initial surgery, Church had the retractor removed at the Swedish Medical Center — Providence. UW Medical Center paid Church a settlement of $97,000.
7. Surgery without anesthesia: In 2006, 73-year-old Baptist minister Sherman Sizemore underwent an exploratory surgery at Raleigh General Hospital to determine the cause of his abdominal pain. However, while the anesthesiologist and nurse anesthetist who worked for Raleigh Anesthesia Associates provided Sizemore with paralyzing drugs that will prevent his muscles from jerking and twitching during surgery, they failed to administer the general anesthesia that would render him unconscious until 16 minutes past the first cut into his abdomen. As a consequence, Sizemore suffered excruciating pain and was unable to move or cry out in sheer anguish. Additionally, the hospital never informed Sizemore that he was not properly anesthetized, and therefore he didn’t know whether his memories were real. As a consequence of this trauma, he couldn’t sleep or be left alone, was tormented by nightmares and believed that people were trying to bury him alive. A few weeks after the surgery, Sizemore shot and killed himself. According to his two daughters who filed a lawsuit against Raleigh Anesthesia Associates, Sizemore had no history of psychological distress previous to the surgery.