Transfusion kills woman with blood from man of same name -
2003.12.21

MOBARA, Chiba -- A female patient died at a public hospital here after receiving a transfusion of the wrong blood type given after a nurse mistook her for a man with exactly the same name, hospital officials said.

Officials from the Nagao Hospital apologized to the family of the 92-year-old woman who died, reported the case to the police and promised to make sure tests for blood type would be carried out with more attention to detail in the future.

It is not known whether the nurse whose blunder led to the woman's death will be punished.

Officials said the elderly woman was hospitalized on Dec. 17 after breaking her leg. A nurse was told to gather a sample of the woman's blood so surgeons would know what type she was as they prepared to give the patient a transfusion.

However, the nurse took the blood sample from an 87-year-old man whose surname was identical to the old woman's. The man had type-A blood, but the old woman was type-O.

After being operated on at around noon on Friday, the old woman was given a transfusion, but she was injected with type-A blood instead of the type-O she needed.

Her condition rapidly deteriorated and she died at about 6 p.m. after her internal organs collapsed and failed. (Mainichi Shimbun, Japan, Dec. 21, 2003)