Serious medical blunders in public hospitals increased by a third last year, lawmakers were told yesterday.
Experts and patients' groups blamed staff shortages and poor management, which they say are eroding morale.
The Hospital Authority received 44 reports of incidents involving death or serious physical or psychological injury from October 2010 to September last year.
That is a sharp increase from 33 during the previous year, according to a report discussed by the Legislative Council's health services panel.
Nine categories of incident were identified. The highest figure was for in-patient suicides, with 20 cases reported. There were 18 reports of objects being left in patients' bodies after surgery and three of surgery being performed on the wrong patient or wrong body part.
Dr Kwok Ka-ki, convenor of the concern group Caring Hong Kong and a former medical sector legislator, said the increase in blunders was understandable and within expectations, but was not acceptable.