Doctor amputates wrong foot

TUXTLA GUTIERREZ, Mexico -- A doctor at a public hospital in southern Mexico mistakenly amputated the right leg of an elderly patient who had sought treatment for an infection in his left foot, the patient's family announced Sunday.
broadband.hrticket.com...

How awful! Acording to the article, the family hasn't told the patient, an elderly man, that they amputated the wrong leg because the shock would kill him. This is the kind of story that would make me laugh, if it wasn't such a horrible thing.

this is something that happens way too often, even here in the U.S.

A couple years ago, my Girfriend was having an operation on her knee, nothing serious.... however, her mother was in the room with her for every doctor consultation and kept asking him,

"now which knee are you operating on",

the morning of the surgery, she made them write on side of the leg that was to opened up....

In my home town this has happened several time in the past 3 yrs. The 2 hospitals in question have now started marking the limb or whatever piece is to be amputated. There is also a Vet. Admin. in our area too. They have adopted the same policy and cant say as I don't blame them. Our V.A. has been using a bar code system to dole out mends and they only did this because several patients wound up missing and several were found on hosp. grounds dead for up to 6 months. I know in M.A.S.H. units over in the big sandbox they are using magic markers to indicate the limb to be severed. I would say as far as someone getting the wrong limb wacked off to get a good lawyer.!

thats terrible...
something more fitting on the "Ignorance Denied" forums...

I had to have a eye taken out a month agaio and you can be sure I had a BIG black this eye writen over the eye to be removed .Needless to say thay did take out the right one .Wich was good as that eye was no good at all and I would have been in a world of hert if they had taken out the wrong one .

If that happened to me.. Wow, I wouldn't know what to do. I can't even comprehend it. Damn slackin' Doctors.

either the person was stupid or drunk while coming to work

The Governmant has taken steps to try to prevent this in the US. Two people have to verify the operative site and sign off on it. Before a surgury or procedure starts (I am not kidding) a staff emmber calls "time out" and verifies the procedure and patient yet again.

The Doctor responsible would probly get away with it, afterall, the patient "wouldnt have a leg to stand on"! ......................................................... Poor bugger