PATIENT’S DEATH DUE TO WRONG MEDICATION

A mother of five dies due to wrong medicine given by the pharmacy
Doctor’s handwriting has mislead the pharmacist

Methotrexate which is given for cancer had been given instead of Metformin. which is to be given for diabetes

You must be familiar that doctor’s hand writing is the worst from all the professionals. Their handwriting is very important as it can decide whether a patient lives or dies.
A resident of Horana who has been 62 years old has been given wrong medication due to a mistake made by a pharmacist. She has been given medication for cancer when she should be medicated for diabetes. She had been Padmalatha Tanthirige, a mother of five who have paid from her life due to the mistake made by the medical professionals. She had been treated by Dr. Amila Panambalama for diabetes from Horana General Hospital. The doctor had prescribed Metfromin to be given for diabetes but the pharmacist had misread it and given Methotrexate instead which is given to cancer patients to reduce excess pain.
The 36 year old son of the lady who passed away has explained the situation as below:
“I am the one who brought my mother medicine… I took the prescription written by Dr Amila and brought the drugs from a pharmacy close by. The drug given by them and the one written by the doctor were alike. I checked both but couldn’t identify anything different. I gave the drugs to my mother to be taken on time. She took about 8 tablets and complained of a sore throat. She lost appetite. Her lips were swollen but it didn’t cross my mind that this could be due to drugs. I took her back to the doctor after two days because there were these weird symptoms. Then the doctor was surprised to see the drugs and asked us as to who prescribed them. He told us that the pharmacy has given us wrong medicine. My mother was transferred to Colombo General Hospital as she was very sick but she passed away. The investigations found that her death has been caused due to doctor’s fault as the prescription was not written clearly.”
An investigation in this regard is been carried out.

A similar incident which was reported recently in our web site pertaining to the death of young school boy at Horana Base hospital could be read from HERE: