Tech News Update

The Fertility Clinic that used the incorrect sperm

When Nancy Andrews, of Commack, N.Y., became pregnant after an in vitro fertilization procedure at a New York fertility clinic, she and her husband expected a gorgeous new addition to their family. What they did not expect was a child whose skin was significantly darker than that of either parent. Subsequent DNA tests suggested that doctors at New York Medical Services for Reproductive Medicine accidentally used another man’s sperm to inseminate Nancy Andrews’ eggs.

The couple has since raised Baby Jessica, who was born Oct. 19, 2004, as their own, according to wire reports. But the couple still filed a malpractice suit against the owner of the clinic, as well as the embryologist who allegedly mixed up the samples.

Received the incorrect heart and lungs, then died

17-year-ancient Jésica Santillán died 2 weeks after receiving the heart and lungs of a patient whose blood type did not match hers. Doctors at the Duke University Medical Center failed to check the compatibility before surgery started. . After a rare second transplant operation to attempt to rectify the error, she suffered brain hurt and complications that subsequently hastened her death.

Santillán, a Mexican immigrant, had come to the United States three years before to seek medical treatment for a life-threatening heart condition. The heart-lung transplant that surgeons at Duke University Hospital in Durham, N.C., hoped would improve this condition instead place her in greater danger; Santillán, who had type-O blood, had received the organs from a type-A donor.

The error sent the patient into a comalike state, and she died shortly after an attempt to switch the organs back out for compatible ones failed. The hospital blamed human error for the death, along with a lack of safeguards to ensure a compatible transplant. According to reports, Duke reached an agreement on an undisclosed settlement with the family. Neither the hospital nor the family is allowed to comment on the case.

A $200,000 testicle

In yet another case of a incorrect-sided operation, surgeons mistakenly removed the healthy right testicle of 47-year-ancient Air Force veteran Benjamin Houghton. The patient had been complaining of pain and shrinkage of his left testicle so doctors chose to schedule surgery to remove it due to cancer fears. But, the veteran’s medical records suggest a series of missteps — from an error on the consent form to a failure on the part of medical personnel to mark the proper surgical site before the procedure. The error, which took place at the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center, spurred a $200,000 lawsuit from Houghton and his wife.

A 13-Inch souvenir

Donald Church, 49, had a tumor in his abdomen when he arrived at the University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle in June 2000. When he left, the tumor was gone — but a metal retractor had taken its place. Doctors admitted to leaving the 13-inch-long retractor in Church’s abdomen by mistake. It was not the first such incident at the medical center; four other such occurrences had been documented at the hospital between 1997 and 2000. Fortunately, surgeons were able to remove the retractor shortly after it was learned, and Church experienced no long-term health consequences from the mistake. The hospital agreed to pay Church $97,000.

An open heart invasive procedure… on the incorrect patient

Joan Morris (a pseudonym) is a 67-year-ancient woman admitted to a teaching hospital for cerebral angiography. The day after that procedure, she mistakenly underwent an invasive cardiac electrophysiology study. After angiography, the patient was transferred to another floor rather than returning to her original bed. Discharge was plotted for the following day. The next morning, but, the patient was taken for a open heart procedure. The patient had been on the operating table for an hour. Doctors had made an incision in her groin, punctured an artery, threaded in a tube and snaked it up into her heart (a procedure with risks of bleeding, infection, heart attack and stroke). That was when the phone rang and a doctor from another department questioned “what are you doing with my patient?” There was nothing incorrect with her heart. The cardiologist working on the woman checked her chart, and saw that he was making an dreadful mistake. The study was aborted, and she was returned to her room in stable condition.

Hospital makes a incorrect-sided brain surgery… for the third time in a year

For the third time on the same year, doctors at Rhode Island Hospital have operated on the incorrect side of a patient’s head. The most recent incident occurred Nov. 23 2007. An 82-year-ancient woman required an operation to stop bleeding between her brain and her skull. A neurosurgeon at the hospital started a surgery by drilling the right side of the patient’s head, even though a CT scan showed bleeding on the left side, according to local reports. The resident reportedly caught his mistake early, after which he closed the initial hole and proceeded on the left side of the patient’s head. The patient was listed in honest condition on Sunday.

The case echoes of a similar mistake last February, in which a different doctor operated on the incorrect side of a patient’s head. And last August, an 86-year-ancient man died three weeks after a surgeon at Rhode Island Hospital accidentally operated on the incorrect side of his head.

The Surgeon who removed the incorrect leg

In what was, perhaps, the most publicized case of a surgical mistake in its time, a Tampa (Florida) surgeon mistakenly removed the incorrect leg of his patient, 52-year-ancient Willie King, during an amputation procedure in February 1995.

It was later revealed that a chain of errors before the surgery culminated in the incorrect leg being prepped for the procedure. While the surgeon’s team realized in the middle of the procedure that they were operating on the incorrect leg, it was already too late, and the leg was removed. As a result of the error, the surgeon’s medical license was suspended for six months and he was fined $10,000. University Community Hospital in Tampa, the medical center where the surgery took place, paid $900,000 to King and the surgeon involved in the case paid an additional $250,000 to King.

The healthy kidney removed by mistake

In St. Louis Park, Minnesota, a patient was submitted at Park Nicollet Methodist Hospital to have one of his kidneys removed because it had a tumor believed to be cancerous. Instead, doctors removed the healthy one.

“The discovery that this was the incorrect kidney was made the next day when the pathologist examined the material and found no evidence of any malignancy,” said Samuel Carlson, M.D. and Park Nicollet Chief Medical Officer. The potentially cancerous kidney remained intact and functioning. For privacy and family’s request, no details about the patient were released.

Wide-Awake Surgery led to his suicide

A West Virginia man’s family claims inadequate anesthetic during surgery allowed him to feel every slice of the surgeon’s scalpel – a trauma they believe led him to take his own life two weeks later. Sherman Sizemore was admitted to Raleigh General Hospital in Beckley, W.Va., Jan. 19, 2006 for exploratory surgery to determine the cause of his abdominal pain. But during the operation, he reportedly experienced a phenomenon known as anesthetic awareness — a state in which a surgical patient is able to feel pain, pressure or discomfort during an operation, but is unable to go or communicate with doctors.

According to the complaint, anesthesiologists administered the drugs to numb the patient, but they failed to give him the general anesthetic that would render him unconscious until 16 minutes after surgeons first cut into his abdomen. Family members say the 73-year-ancient Baptist minister was driven to kill himself by the traumatic experience of being awake during surgery but unable to go or weep out in pain.

Not so amusing: incorrect artery bypassed

Two months after a double bypass heart operation that was supposed to save his life, comedian and former Saturday Night Live cast member Dana Carvey got some disheartening news: the cardiac surgeon had bypassed the incorrect artery. It took another emergency operation to clear the blockage that was threatening to kill the 45-year-ancient funnyman and father of two young kids. Responding to a $7.5 million lawsuit Carvey brought against him, the surgeon said he’d made an honest mistake because Carvey’s artery was unusually situated in his heart. But Carvey didn’t see it that way: “It’s like removing the incorrect kidney. It’s that huge a mistake,” the entertainer told People magazine.

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