Brain Surgery On Wrong Side Of Head Three Times At Same Hospital

It was reported today that a Rhode Island hospital has been fined $50,000 by the Rhode Island Department of Health and reprimanded after a doctor performed brain surgery on the wrong side of the patient’s head.
According to reports, this was the third time this year at the particular hospital that a doctor performed brain surgery on the wrong side of the patient’s head.
The most recent case happened last Friday when the Chief Resident began surgery on the wrong side of an 82 year-old patient’s brain. Fortunately, the patient is reported to be doing okay after the surgery. In February of this year, a different doctor performed neurosurgery on the wrong side of another patient’s head. That patient was reported to be doing okay as well.
However, in August of this year, a patient died a few weeks after a third doctor operated on the wrong side of his brain. That death prompted the State Department of Health to order the hospital to take steps to ensure such a mistake would never happen again. Obviously, if the hospital did take such steps they were ineffective. The hospital is a teaching hospital for Brown University.