The system was introduced at some mortuaries last August or September and was extended to all mortuaries at public hospitals in March, Dr Lee said.

'We are very satisfied with the new system and will carry out a review in a few months,' he said.

Under the new system, patients admitted to hospitals are given a wristband printed with a two-dimensional bar code.

Unlike one-dimensional bar codes, which could carry only a set of numbers, two-dimensional codes could contain detailed information about a patient, including their name, sex and identity card numbers, Dr Lee said.

When a patient dies, ward workers print out a document with the patient's personal particulars.

Before the body is sent to the mortuary, workers check its identity by scanning the two-dimensional bar code on the wristband and comparing that information with the patient's identity document.

When mortuary officers receive the body, they repeat the steps to avoid any mix-up.

Meanwhile, the family of the deceased is issued a collection form printed with the same bar code as that on the patient's wristband. Mortuary workers will cross-check by scanning the bar codes before giving bodies to families.

Further, a new HK$2.4 million computer system gives the authority real-time data on the number of bodies in all public hospital mortuaries, and body transaction records.

Early last year, Prince of Wales Hospital's mortuary mixed up two corpses that were placed in the same compartment, giving the body of an 88-year-old man to the family of a dead 77-year-old man, who cremated the body.

From April last year to last Friday, 318 compartments had been added to public hospital mortuaries, bringing the total to more than 1,800, Dr Lee said. More than 300 additional compartments would be installed by the end of March.

The problem 'has improved a lot', Dr Lee said.

Queen Elizabeth Hospital pathology department associate consultant Cheuk Wah said the occupancy rates of its mortuary usually ranged from 70 to 80 per cent, but declined to reveal the rates in previous years.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health said all four public mortuaries under its management had adopted a computerised system last year to ensure bodies went to the right families.

Body count

Maximum capacity of four public mortuaries under the Department of Health's management (other than those at public hospitals): 742

Number of deaths in the city in 2007: 39,963

Number of compartments at public hospitals' mortuaries at present: 1,800

SOURCES: HOSPITAL AUTHORITY, IMMIGRATION DEPARTMENT, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH