RI hospital fined for third wrong-site surgery this year
Patient Safety Monitor Alert
November 28, 2007
After a doctor began to operate on the wrong side of a patient's brain last week, Rhode Island Hospital has been fined $50,000 by the state Department of Health, reports the The Providence Journal. This incident was the third wrong-site surgery specific to neurosurgery to occur at the hospital this year. Once the physician realized his error (just after breaking the skin), he corrected his missteps and repaired the original injury.The Department of Health found that the required timeout, a facet of the Universal Protocol, was not performed prior to the patient's surgery. The hospital would not provide the name of the surgeon. However, because of the frequency of errors, it is most likely the hospital's actions to prevent errors that should receive the most blame, says the article.
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