Four Kenyan medics have been suspended after cutting open the skull of the wrong patient at a hospital in Nairobi.
One patient needed surgery for a blood clot on the brain, the other only non-invasive treatment for swelling. But a horrifying mix-up of identification tags saw the wrong man operated on, reports say.
The doctors did not realise their mistake until “hours into the surgery, when they discovered there was no blood clot”, the Daily Nation reported.
The head of the Kenyatta National Hospital said the patient was “in recovery and progressing well” and an investigation is underway.
How do you conduct brain surgery on the wrong patient? Kenyatta National Hospital has outdone themselves. Horrfying!!!!
— Carol Radull (@CarolRadull) March 1, 2018
This is brain surgery…now imagine how many people could have been misdiagnosed, given wrong medicine, discharged at the wrong time,billed incorrectly, taken to surgery for no good reason? In a functioning country, the CEO would have resigned by now. @WilliamsRuto @UKenyatta
— Another_Kenya (@AnotherKenya) March 2, 2018
If you have a potbelly, avoid Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH)…. You may end up at the maternity ward#SheDecidesDay#MyiPhoneKe
— Muthui Wakanda (@MuthuiMkenya) March 2, 2018
The board regulating medical practice says such a mix-up is a first in the country.
It has demanded a report from the hospital and plans to hold a hearing. Social media users have expressed shock that such an incident could have been allowed to happen.
It comes only six weeks after the health minister ordered an investigation into claims new mothers were sexually assaulted at the same hospital.
Theft of babies, rape allegations, brain surgery on the wrong patient.. Anyway, healthcare and good governance are things we don’t vote for. If the CEO of Kenyatta National Hospital was Alfred Keter, he would have been fired kitambo! Politics & mediocrity run this country.
— Muthui Wakanda (@MuthuiMkenya) March 2, 2018
