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MEDICAL

Baby ‘could have died’ due to hospital drug error

A three-month old baby was mistakenly prescribed a dose of painkillers ten-times higher than the recommended level following an operation at Astrid Lindgren Children’s Hospital near Stockholm.

Published: 12 October 2009 08:46 CEST
Baby 'could have died' due to hospital drug error

Had the infant’s parents not discovered the mistake, the child could have received serious and life-threatening injuries to its liver.

The hospital has now reported the matter to the National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialstyrelsen), the Dagens Nyheter (DN) newspaper reports.

The child had undergone an operation on its ear and thereafter been prescribed medicine to ease that pain in the form of liquid paracetamol (also known as acetaminophen).

Instead of being given 60 milligrammes of the drug, the infant’s IV drip was outfitted with a bottle containing 60 millilitres, a level ten-times higher than normal.

“The parents thought that the bottle looked too large for such a small child. It was lucky,” said Peter Redell, head of the hospital’s paediatric anesthesiology and intensive care ward, to DN.

Similar mistakes have happened previously at the clinic and Redell said he was present for one such incident.

In September, a three-month old girl died at the hospital. A subsequent autopsy revealed that she had been given an extremely high dose of the anaesthetic Pentothal.

The girl’s doctor was detained on suspicion of manslaughter but was released after three days.

The health board conducted its own investigation of the incident and concluded that the neither the doctor nor the hospital had done anything wrong. However, prosecutor Peter Claeson has yet to decide whether or not he will file charges over the baby’s death.

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STATISTICS

Norway saw fewer hospital patients in 2020 despite pandemic

Fewer patients were treated in hospital in 2020 than in 2019, with Covid-19 being the reason for the drop, according to Statistics Norway.

Published: 13 April 2021 16:25 CEST
Norway saw fewer hospital patients in 2020 despite pandemic
Illustration photo by Audun Braastad / AFP)

The decline in patients has been largest for those awaiting planned treatments, but the number of people requiring immediate attention also dropped too, according to Statistics Norway figures.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, hospitals had to prioritise differently in 2020 as a result of the increased need for intensive care units.

“2020 was a year marked by pandemics and restrictions. In many places hospitals have had to prioritise differently due to the coronavirus, and perhaps particularly as the result of the increased need for intensive care,” the report said.

This has contributed to a decrease in the number of patients in hospitals at all levels of care.

The number of patients with 24-hour stays decreased by 7 percent. The total number of days spent in hospital fell by 11 percent or 380,000 fewer days in a hospital bed in 2020 compared to 2019.

Hospital stays lasting at least 24 hours include both planned and unplanned visits. In 2020 planned visits accounted for 29 percent of all visits, which is a decrease of 16 percent from the previous year, while visits for immediate appointments decreased by 3 percent.

READ ALSO: Norwegian senior medic calls for geographical division of Covid-19 restrictions

The figures show a decline for almost all diagnostic groups, but cancer patients had a smaller decline than other groups.

Planned treatment of various forms of cancer decreased by 8 percent, but acute help for tumours saw an increase of 11 percent.

This reverses a trend of numbers of patients in hospitals increasing year on year. The increases had primarily been driven by patients at outpatient clinics.

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