Doctors missed crucial signs in patients’ X-rays in fatal lung cancer blunder, Hong Kong hospital bosses admit
- Two patients were diagnosed with the disease, and one who visited Princess Margaret Hospital, died in January
- City’s doctors stretched to breaking point because of flu season
As many as eight doctors missed abnormalities in X-rays in three patients, two of whom were eventually diagnosed with lung cancer, hospital authorities revealed on Friday.
Announcing the results of an investigation into the blunder, the Hospital Authority pledged to enhance its system and said it would begin to study the feasibility of artificial intelligence support for staff by the end of the year.
In November last year, the authority said it had set up an investigation panel after it found out three patients in public hospitals had lesions in chest X-rays, taken between 2016 and last year, that went unnoticed.
Two of the patients – who visited Prince of Wales Hospital and Princess Margaret Hospital in November last year – were later found to be diagnosed with lung cancer. One of the patients subsequently died in January, a source said.
“If I did not remember wrongly, there were seven to eight doctors involved in looking at the X-rays,” said Dr Chung Kin-lai, the authority’s director for quality and safety, adding they came from the A&E, general internal medicine and surgery departments.