Screw top!!!
Posted on 11/27/2007 7:56:35 AM PST by laotzu
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Rhode Island Hospital has been fined $50,000 and reprimanded by the state Department of Health after its third instance this year of a doctor performing brain surgery in the wrong side of a patient's head.
"We are extremely concerned about this continuing pattern," health department director David R. Gifford said in a statement Monday.
The hospital issued a statement saying it was re-evaluating its training and policies, providing more oversight, giving nursing staff the power to ensure procedures are followed, among other steps.
The most recent case happened Friday when the chief resident started operating on the wrong side of an 82-year-old patient's brain, the health department said. The patient was OK, the health department and hospital said.
In February, a different doctor performed neurosurgery on the wrong side of another patient's head, said Andrea Bagnall-Degos, a health department spokeswoman. That patient was also OK, she said.
In August, however, a patient died a few weeks after a third doctor operated on the wrong side of his brain. The death prompted the state to order the hospital to take a series of steps to ensure such a mistake would not happen again, including an independent review of its neurosurgery practices and better verification from doctors of surgery plans.
The hospital is owned by Lifespan, a not-for-profit corporation. It serves as a teaching hospital for Brown University.
Remember 50% of all doctors were in the lower 1/2 of their class.
.....Bob
Maybe they should try “Port - Starboard”.
....ahah
They must have hired the “Bad Doctor” from Kids In the Hall:
Wanna know something? I’m a bad doctor. I’m not boasting. I mean, who would? Just stating a fact that I’ve never really gotten the hang of the whole healing-the-sick thing. And don’t interpret this as some sort of false modesty. No, I’m homogeneously unqualified to practice medicine in any capacity. I *really* don’t have a clue. And no one could be more shocked than me that I’ve been allowed to rise to a position of such importance and responsibility.
I guess it all started in high school where I was a very bad science student. One day when we were supposed to be dissecting a frog, I accidentally disassembled my desk. Oh, but, you know, I was a popular kid. You know, the other students were always eager to help me out. So you know, during a test whenever I’d get that *confused* look on my face - which was invariably - well, the cheat notes would just start flying! Even the teachers would start whispering answers, you know, *ahem* mitochondria... But I didn’t worry about it. I figured, how far could you coast on charm? Well, pretty far, actually!
They just offered me the job of Chief of Surgery. Apparently, I’ve logged more hours in surgery than any other man my age. Four thousand hours this year alone. What no one seems to have noticed that it was all with the same patient.
Oh, I want to show you something. You know what this is? Urine. Another man’s urine. I ask for it, and they give it to me! I don’t know what to do with it! I’ve got a fridge full of this stuff. I mean, I suppose I could send it out to the lab, but they’d only send back a lot of test results that I couldn’t possibly understand.
The only thing I’m actually sorta good at is referrals. You know that thing where doctors send patients to other doctors. Well, I’m the king of referrals. What I do is I call the, uh, the sick person into my office, and I stare for a long time really seriously at this blank sheet of paper. Then I say, “Hmmm. I’d like you to see someone. He’s a specialist in this area.” (laughs) There are specialists who have their whole career based on my referrals. I am the cornerstone of a medical empire. (sighs) Well, I really should be going. I’ve gotta tell the family that the patient didn’t make it - hardest part of being a doctor...I think!
Screw top!!!
My left or his left?
This is beyond belief!
How can they be so careless and totally stupid?
When they open up the patient’s skull, can’t they even tell that they are looking at the healthy side?!
Where is the neurosurgeon who is supervising the residents? Also, the residents already have their MD, and went through internship — so how can they be so careless and stupid, as I said, but bears repeating.
There should be some severe penalties.
Fining the hospital $50,000 is NOTHING. They should have fined all the doctors involved some significant amount that they have to pay out of their own pockets.
This shows that some malpractice suits are justified.
Named Abby-something?
("It's pronounced eye-gore")
So they operated on the wrong side of the brain 3 times this year!!!
They year still has a month to go. They have an excellent chance of doing it again ;)
I agree. The patient (or more probably medicare) probably paid 50k for the operation to start with.
50k is just insult atop injury.
You would think a notice would go out after the FIRST.
Wonder if they eliminated their QA dept for cost cutting?
Re: Fining the hospital $50,000 is NOTHING.
Agree 100%. Until serious measures are taken against things like this, they will only continue. And $50,000 is NOT a serious measure.
I hope someone will do a thorogh investigation. One of the articles about the incidents said, that one of the hospital’s remedy is to give the nursing staff authority “to ensure the proper process” or something like that — are they now deferring responsiblity to nurses, instead of holdin the doctors responsible?!
The hospital doesn’t take this seriously either.
...and to think, the same people operating on the wrong sides of peoples brains will say I’m more dangerous since I own firearms... yeah whatever!
Every time they damage a brain, the Democrat base grows.
I bought my first car off of a neurosurgeon who was going back to his home country after being trained here.First thing I did after getting it home was wash and wax the car , that was when I found pot seeds in the carpets and a set of womans panties under the back seat.
It wasn’t that much later when I realized he was way smarter than me and had a much greater knowledge of anatomy than what I possessed because i never was able to figure out how to do it in the back seat of that 72 Camaro.
"...a doctor performing brain surgery in the wrong side of a patient's head.".sneppah taht nehw ti etah I .remmuB
,yllaidroC
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