Doctor Danger: 4 Surprising Ways Your Surgery Could Go Wrong

In today's modern world of improved technological advances, surgeries at a hospital or a clinic should be more efficient and effective than ever. Usually that is the case. Many estimate that 95 percent of surgeries for health reasons are not only successful, but there are no future complications. However, there have been some unusual circumstances where surgery has gone wrong to the point of it becoming odd. Many times it comes to simple malpractice as there were nearly 10,000 such cases on an annual basis due to wrong surgical procedures Here are four ways in which surgery didn't go as planned.

1) Operate on the wrong body part

A few people have been known to ask for black markers before a surgery. They then proceed to circle or "X" the part of their body that is supposed to be operated on. This may sound overly paranoid, but there is actually a good reason why they draw these markings. People have had the wrong body part operated on. There have been cases where surgeons have gone in, through a simple misread or an incorrect patient chart, and performed surgery on the wrong part of body leading to potentially disastrous results. Sounds outlandish, but true cases have occurred. An example would be in the 1995 case involving a man named Willie King who had the wrong foot amputated on. A good idea is to discuss with the nurse and the surgeon just beforehand where the operation will take place just to get everyone on the same page.

2) Treating the wrong patient

This may seem odd, but keep in mind that surgeons and physicians at hospitals tend to have long continuous shifts. Even after 2011 when regulations were put in place to try to curtail shifts to 30 hours and less for younger residents, there are still practices where hospital personnel go through some long working hours. This can lead to situations where medical personnel fail to check whether or not they have the right patient for the right operation. This can lead to patients having the wrong procedure done to them. Make sure that the nurses and doctors really do check that bar code on your wrist before getting wheeled into the operating room to ensure you are the right patient for a particular surgery.

3) Items can get Left Behind

Sometimes, the operation itself is a success but things can still go very wrong. Everything was done fine and the medical issues had been solved but it’s what gets left behind that can be an issue. Whether it is a sponge or tape or even some scissors, surgery teams have been prone to leave behind instruments and materials within a patient's body! Having a foreign object within a body can be dangerous and can lead to potential infection or even internal bleeding. The use of more advanced equipment today such as electrosurgical generators have cut down on the need for various items, but there is still a chance something like this can happen if the medical staff isn't careful.

4) Mixing up the tubes

Sometimes, there are tubes sticking out of a patient's body during an operation. Some are feeding tubes and others are chest tubes. However, they can easily look alike to some overworked surgeon. The next thing that happens is that food pills end up going down into a chest cavity, leading to some dangerous complications if it lands in the wrong part of a person's anatomy. These are just four of a myriad of examples in which a surgery can go horribly wrong. Given the long working hours in a hospital by surgeons and staff, it is quite possible that a mental mistake could be made for a number of reasons. But odds are still pretty high that your surgery will be a successful one!