Surgical error: UHM doctor operates on wrong ear of child

In a surgical goof-up, a senior doctor at the second biggest government hospital here, the Ursula Horseman Memorial (UHM) Hospital, operated upon the right ear of a six year-oldchild instead of the problematic left ear. Surprisingly, this happened even though the child had gone through various tests and the reports were available to the doctor, according to the parents.

The child Mohammad Rashad had fallen off the roof two years ago in Fahimabad, Chamangunj . The injury resulted in ear bleeding and doctors suggested surgery to fix the tympanum or the eardrum.

After the surgery, when Rashad’s mother Zeba saw the bandage on the right ear in place of the left, she confronted doctor RK Varma who had operated.

The doctor said the child had told about the problem in the right ear in the operation theatre. The ear was also infected so the operation was done. The family was making baseless allegations against him, he said.

But Zeba and her husband Saeed refused to be browbeaten about the negligence and approached the Kotwali police with a complaint. Police, however, refused to take the complaint.

“He has removed the tympanum of the wrong ear; the problem remains,” said Saeed.

“The private hospitals were asking for Rs 2 lakh. We could not afford it so we went to the UHM hospital. Dr RK Varma told us the surgical process would cost us Rs 50,000 and the tympanum would be treated,” Zeba said. “He made my child go through various tests and got all the reports. Now he is threatening us to not pursue this matter or the consequences would be serious. He took the money but did not solve the problem and instead put my child in more agony,” she said.

Director, UHM hospital Dr RC Bhatt said he had come to know about the wrong surgery. “This is serious. When all the reports of the child were available in the operation theatre why were they not seen,” he said, adding an inquiry would be conducted and the report would be sent to the state government.

To note, UHM hospital has been courting controversies because of wrong operations in the past one month. Recently, the medical authorities have been investigating a complaint in which a doctor allegedly removed the uterus of a patient when he was supposed to take out the gall bladder in a surgery two weeks ago.

The hospital has barred Dr Prashant Mishra from conducting surgeries till further orders. Dr RC Bhatt said a medical board was being constituted and its findings would be sent to the government to decide whether or not OT would be allotted to Dr Mishra and to take penal action against him if he was found guilty.