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Calls for department to handle medical blunder complaints after three nurses found guilty of professional misconduct over father’s death
“I hope the public knows there is something wrong with our medical system,” said Brian Wang, whose 73-year-old father, suffering from cancer, died five years ago after a breathing hole in his throat was blocked by gauze.
“There is no easy way for me to seek justice for my father. I felt I was being kicked around by different departments,” said Wang, who works in the retail sector.
Three nurses were found guilty of professional misconduct yesterday following the death of Wang’s father, Wang Keng-kao, in Kowloon Hospital, in Kowloon City on November 14, 2011.
Before his father’s death, Wang said he had twice confronted the nurses over gauze covering a 2 cm-diameter hole in his father’s trachea – the only channel through which he could breathe.
The gauze was secured with tape on all four sides, and sometimes soaked with phlegm.
But Wang said the nurses ignored his complaints and told him to ask the doctors.
According to the autopsy, a piece of gauze was found blocking Wang’s bronchi – the main passageway into the lungs.
The hospital conducted an investigation and found there was a lack of awareness among the medical staff that the patient had a permanent tracheotomy.
But the report failed to shed light on whether any medical staff had been held responsible or penalised for the mistake, Wang said.
That was when Wang decided to begin his long journey of finding out who was responsible for the incident, by taking the case to the Nursing Council and the Medical Council.
He described how he had slept very little in the first few years of filing the complaints, since there were a lot of documents and emails to handle at the time.
“Since I have a full-time job, I could only handle matters after work. Very often I worked alone until 2 or 3am by my computer every day while the rest of my family slept,” Wang said.
“I once thought of giving up since it was too hard, and my friends and family told me it was not worth the effort. But if I had given up, there would be no justice and the whole incident would have been forgotten.”
In November last year, the Nursing Council notified him that a hearing into the conduct of 12 nurses involved in his father’s care would begin. The first verdict was announced on Monday. .
He was still waiting for a reply from the Medical Council.
“It is really a relief after a long fight. But it was worth it,” Wang said, adding there should be a department to handle all the medical blunder complaints from victims and their families against medical professionals, he said.
(SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST)
