24, February 2010
Chandigarh, India
Minutes after the blood transfusion process began, hospital staff noticed the blood group was wrong
A BLUNDER was averted at the Government Medical College and Hospital, Sector 32, after a wrong blood group administered to a patient was detected minutes within the transfusion process began. The incident took place late on Tuesday evening.
Hospital authorities said the ‘error’ was detected by the paramedic staff and the patient was stable.
Amrik Singh, a middleaged resident of Sector 49, was admitted in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) 15 days ago.
After a bronchial asthma attack, he had suffered two cardiac arrests.
Sources said he underwent resuscitation after the cardiac attacks and had been in a critical condition ever since he was admitted.
On Tuesday, his blood was to be transfused. But instead of Amrik’s blood group (A+), B+ was transfused.
Head of the Department of Blood Transfusion Prof S Basu admitted the mismatch of blood groups took place.
“The patient had been admitted in the ICU for several days. Several times ear- t lier, his blood was transfused. But due to some error last night, the wrong blood was transfused, which was detected in time by our staff. The patient is stable now,” Prof Basu said. “Such an error should not have happened. We are looking into how the mistake occurred.”
Doctors at the department said a unit of blood is cleared at several points before it reaches the patient. “There are checks in place. We have to see where the error occurred,” a hospital official said.
The Medical Superintendent of GMCH, Dr Vipin Kaushal, said concrete details on the case would be available by Thursday.
The family of the patient, meanwhile, has not lodged a complaint yet.
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