Eugene P. Sinclair, M.D., President-Elect of the American Society of Anesthesiologists, wrote the following in the February 2004 issue of the American Society of Anesthesiologists Newsletter:
- For many years, I regarded wrong-site surgery as urban mythology. In my mind, it was a series of tales of appalling events that had never happened; they were fiction, complete fabrication, never authentic.
On April 1, 1984, a friend told me about his uncle, a successful businessman and, despite blindness in one eye secondary to a childhood injury, top-notch golfer who twice had been the Wisconsin amateur champion.
Because the blind eye had become painfully diseased, his uncle agreed to its surgical removal. After surgery he awoke to total darkness and asked where he was. The surgeon answered, "Mr. _______, I made a terrible mistake."
I promptly told my friend that he had terrible taste in his choice of April Fool's pranks. Sadly this gut-wrenching story was true.
There is not much to add to the above.
If it can happen, it will happen.
I'm aware of many healthy legs amputed, uninjured joints replaced, and more, at U.C.L.A. Medical Center, University of Southern California Medical Center, University of Virginia Hospital, and just about every hospital I've ever worked in.
In my consulting work, I've become aware of even more such disasters, at hospitals big and small, famous and minor alike.
Want to protect your health? Avoid doctors and keep out of their offices and hospitals.
Article comments
1 - Franco Castalone
One solution: a patient used a magic marker to draw an arrow and the words "this ovary" on her lower abdomen.