Three-member panel to probe blood blunder

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, May 22

A three-member inquiry committee has been constituted to investigate how wrong blood was transfused to a woman patient at Civil Hospital here yesterday.

The Civil Surgeon, Dr Parwinderpal Singh Sidhu, has given two days’ time to the committee to submit its report to him. The committee comprises Dr Jasbir, Dr Amrit Chawla and Dr Puneet Sidhu.

When Dr Sidhu was asked about an attendant at the blood bank (against whom many complaints had been received earlier) who was on duty yesterday when the incident took place, he said if the allegations against the attendant came true, action would be taken against him as per law.

A patient, Lakshmi, could have lost her life yesterday, had her husband not noticed wrong blood being transfused to her. While her blood group was B+, she was being transfused the blood of A + group by the hospital staff.  The hospital authorities had maintained that there was another female patient named Rashmi, and the A+ blood was to be transfused to her. When the attendant at the blood bank called out Rashmi’s name, Lakshmi’s mother-in-law took it for Lakshmi and she received the A + blood from the counter, said the authorities.