CNN Report: Study Shows Surgery Mix-ups More Common Than You Might Think

Study Shows Surgery Mix-ups More Common Than You Might Think

“Unthinkable errors by doctors and surgeons — such as amputating the wrong leg or removing organs from the wrong patient — occur more frequently than previously believed, a new study suggests.  …  Catastrophic surgical errors are ‘a lot more common than the public thinks,’ says Dr. Martin Makary, M.D., a professor of surgery and public health at Johns Hopkins University, in Baltimore.”

“One of the worst cases I saw in this study was two patients who had had prostate biopsies,” [lead researcher Dr. Philip] Stahel says. “One had cancer and one did not. Clinicians mixed up the samples and the patient without cancer had a radical prostatectomy — which is a huge surgery, removal of an organ for nothing — while the patient with cancer [was] still walking out in the community, not knowing his true diagnosis.”

Here at Patterson Bray, we recently handled a similar type case.  We represented a client who ultimately settled her case for over $1 million after her radiological studies were erroneously mixed up by hospital employees resulting in extensive, invasive procedures being performed on the wrong patient, while the true patient was left untreated.

Click here for the CNN Report with reports to the Health.com story.