Wrong patient treated with kidney transplanted in a hospital in New Jersey

A wrong patient is given a kidney transplant accidentally by a hospital in New Jersey

A wrong patient was accidentally given a kidney transplant in Virtua Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in New Jersey.
According to the officials, the hospital transplanted a kidney to the wrong patient. It was accidentally done because a patient who was to be treated as the same name and was of the same age as that of the wrong patient.

Both the patients had a similar name and ages.

It was considered an unprecedented event by the hospital.

The problem was identified a day after the event when a member of the hospital’s clinical team noticed that the first transplant was not carried out as per the priority order. Instead, they were lower in the list. The United Network for organ sharing manages the transplant list.

However, the patient who was supposed to be treated with an initial kidney transplant successfully received another kidney after a week. Officials said that both the patients are healthy.

According to the officials, over 113,000 people are listed for organ transplantation from which 95,000 are waiting for kidney transplants.

The executive vice president and chief clinical officer at Virtua Health Reginald Blaber said, “Mistakes of this magnitude are rare. Additional verification would have prevented this error despite the unusual circumstances of similar patient identities.”

According to the website of Virtua Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, this hospital is the only facility available in southern New Jersey which provides liver, kidney and pancreas transplants.